Stephen Hawking: God didn't create universe - <AUTHOR> http://www.cnn.com/2010/WORLD/europe/09/02/hawking.god.universe/index.html <comment><USER3> > _And, indeed, he argues, any form of intelligent life that evolves anywhere > will automatically find that it lives somewhere suitable for it._

Definitely deserves a "well, duh", but _so many people_ seem averse to this line of thought. I can't count the number of times people have argued in my vicinity for God's existence based on how nicely our planet suits us... while in the same breath demonstrating that they understand _nothing_ about what they're arguing against.

That said, the world _is_ trying to kill us. If we didn't fight back with intelligence and reproduction, we'd die off rather quickly. Maybe it's not so suitable for us.

<comment><USER4> I find the anthropic principle unpersuasive. It is entirely irrelevant to the question it tries to answer.

Imagine applying it in a different circumstance. Imagine two people coming upon a computer terminal, upon which was typed an elaborate love letter addressed to one of them.

"What's this? John has written me a love letter!"

"Nonsense, it's just noise. Probably a stack dump or something."

"What? The odds are clearly against that."

"Ah, but if it hadn't happened, we wouldn't be having this conversation, would we? Since the letter is necessary for the discussion, it requires no explanation."

This is clearly wrong. The correct rejoinder is,

"Yes, that's just the point. We _shouldn't_ be having this discussion, but we _are_. Hence the letter still requires explanation, and the simplest is that John wrote it."

The fact that our universe suits us _does_ require explanation. If it didn't suit us, we couldn't ask the question, true enough. But that's just the point. We _shouldn't_ be here to ask the question and yet here we _are_. It still requires explanation. Now, you can say, "Well, the universe is one of many, and we're in the one that suits us because we couldn't live anywhere else." Fine. Count the universes, run the probabilities, that's an explanation. Or you can say, "God created it." That's an explanation, too.

What you cannot say is, "If it didn't suit us, we wouldn't be having this conversation, so it requires no explanation." That's a bunch of anti- intellectual sophistry that just annoys the people trying to honestly grapple with the question.

<comment><USER3> Certainly, but "God created it" is the ultimate wild-card explanation. It's identical to saying "because." In what way is that simpler?

I can balance this equation: x = x + 1. The solution is to add God to both sides. Simple!

The quote is primarily meant to point out that we wouldn't likely exist in a location that isn't nigh-ideally suited for us, both because we require it to continue and because we adapt to match it. Using it to prove God exists strikes me as a greater misuse than using it to prove it's possible God doesn't, given _any_ comprehension of large numbers and evolution.

<comment><USER5> "God created it" and "large numbers and evolution" are both ultimate wildcard explanations, when used carelessly. Both can be equivalent to adding infinity to both sides of your equation.

> _"we wouldn't likely exist in a location that isn't nigh-ideally suited for > us"_

Right, but that only answers a weak variant of the argument. The stronger variant is that the universe shouldn't have _any_ locations suited for the evolution of _any_ form of intelligent life. The fact that we're here indicates that there is a location suited for the evolution of intelligent life, which requires an explanation.

There are lots of approaches you can take to provide an explanation. "We wouldn't be asking if we didn't exist" is a weak and unsatisfying approach.

<comment><USER3> > _Both can be equivalent to adding infinity to both sides of your equation._

Admittedly very accurate, but not quite the same. To pull from another oft- repeated quote, time + randomness will never create a pocket watch, because there is not a series of changes which leads to it within dumb evolution. God / intelligence _can_. What evolution+time describes is _very_ much a strict, significantly-smaller subset of a God's capabilities.

<comment><USER5> > _What evolution+time describes is very much a strict, significantly-smaller > subset of a God's capabilities._

The rational numbers are a significantly-smaller subset of the real numbers. Yet adding a countable infinity to both sides of your equation is just as useless as adding an uncountable infinity.

Similarly, "God did it", "there are a lot of universes", "we wouldn't be able to ask if we weren't here so it doesn't need explaining", and "evolution + time" can all be very unsatisfying answers to the stronger variant of the argument I described above. They're all essentially big wildcards, though some are bigger than others. Whichever argument you choose needs a LOT more detail before it becomes better than simply adding infinity to both sides of the equation.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> I find it funny how _hands-off_ the article is. CNN tries too hard not to offend anyone, and unlike most articles, it doesn't actually present its own opinion.

Which would be nice to see in everyday reporting, but it seems the risk of offending people is the only way to garner true neutrality.

<comment><USER7> This is just my opinion, but I think big news networks should keep their opinions out of their reporting, supplying us with as much factual information as possible (even if some would find those facts offensive). I find this article to be good reporting because it introduces Hawking's controversial opinion and a few opinion-based reactions without muddling them with its own bias.

<comment><USER8> Unfortunately, "keeping their opinions out" and reporting both sides is no guarantee of avoiding bias. By way of analogy, let's pretend Hawking said something slightly different from what he actually did, something a bit more non-committal like "Formerly, it was widely thought that the existence of the universe and its suitability for life are good reasons to believe in a creator, but in the light of present-day physics I think we must say that these things offer no evidence whatever concerning the existence or not- existence of any sort of god". Now, imagine two possible articles reacting to this:

1\. Quotes hypothetical-Hawking's statement. In the interests of balance, also quotes a theologian who claims that the existence and well-suited-to-us-ness of the universe really do demand that there be a creator.

2\. Quotes hypothetical-Hawking, as in #1. In the interests of balance, also quotes someone who maintains that present-day science is not neutral on the God question but offers strong evidence for the nonexistence of God.

The first would give the impression that the real debate is between those who think modern science gives evidence for God and those who think it's neutral. The second would give the impression that the real debate is between those who think modern science gives evidence against God and those who think it's neutral.

Someone puts out a report saying that anthropogenic global warming is going to be twice as bad as currently forecast. Newspaper 1 quotes the report and gets some "balance" from a climate scientist who defends the current consensus figure. Newspaper 2 quotes the report and gets some "balance" from someone who doesn't believe in anthropogenic global warming at all.

Someone puts out a report saying that 20% of Americans believe that Barack Obama is a Muslim. Newspaper 1 gives this "balanced" coverage by quoting the report and talking to one person who believes Obama is a Muslim and one who doesn't. Newspaper 2 gives it "balanced" coverage by quoting the report and talking to one person who believes it and one who thinks the whole idea is so ridiculous that the report must the the result of push-polling, sampling screwups or something.

During the recent US healthcare reform debate, Newspaper 1 reports on the proposals before Congress and provides "balance" by quoting someone who thinks those proposals will mean "death panels" and nationial bankruptcy. Newspaper 2 provides "balance" by quoting someone who thinks they don't go nearly far enough and what the US needs is a robust single-payer system.

Giving equal time to both sides is only unbiased in so far as there's no question what "both sides" are.

See also: <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Overton_window> .

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> So the reason there is a God, is that there must be a reason everything is created. I have tried to find out why that must be so, but have not come up with it. The only reason I could think of why people are saying this is that it might feel better for us humans that there is a reason.

<comment><USER10> If you assume causality, eventually you reach the problem of Primus Motivator. If the universe expands because of the Big Bang, what caused the Big Bang? What caused that thing to cause it; why did it do it?

Causality is such a fundamental concept that it is nearly impossible to consider a universe without a cause. Consequently, some funky research has been done on it in physics, but I haven't read any of it.

<comment><USER11> One thing most people forget is that we simply don't have much information about the universe. All we know about it is what we can see from our pale blue dot.

For all we know the big bang never happened and the reason the galaxies seem to be moving "away" is because we are in a current of moving galaxies. (And the universe is truly infinite not only space but in mass.)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> First the existence of aliens and now the existence of God. What totally unscientific speculation is Stephen Hawking going to make next for the media to latch on to?

<comment><USER3> Read/re-read the article. Or at least the title. He's not speculating that God _might_ exist, he's saying he understands the sentiments that lead people to feel that way, while the book goes on with why he says they're wrong.

<comment><USER12> >He's not speculating that God might exist...

I understand that. I just don't understand why he feels the need to start making these unscientific speculations about whether God does or does exist or whether aliens do or don't exist.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> A perfect title for a post not to be read. If you don't believe in God then for sure that you don't believe that he creates the universe. So nothing fancy here.

</comment><comment><USER14> Evolution, that's where many scientists and skeptics fail to address the _big question_. I can't believe that life _evolves_ , in the sense of growing organs to meet specific needs. Natural selection does not work like that: if you have organs which don't suit you, they atrophy, that's it; if they suit you, those which have them stronger will survive. That's it. You don't grow wings to fly, lungs to breath air, brains to think. OTOH, believing in a creator just moves the issue elsewhere: who created such creator? Is he/she/it alone? I've grown comfortable with not knowing for sure what the heck we are doing here.

<comment><USER15> The key problem with this line of reasoning is a lack of proportion. Evolution takes place over _millions of years_. Any intuitions you have are probably wrong on this timescale.

Nobody claims that a proto-bird one day woke up in a treetop, thought "oh heck, how am I going to get down?", and sprouted wings. Rather, over _millions of generations_ of proto-birds, random variation and natural selection made winged birds more numerous and successful than wingless birds.

The point about evolutionary theory isn't that it explains everything, but that it gives us a framework to produce and evaluate explanations (for, potentially, everything). The general pattern is to imagine a series of incremental changes _between generations_ from (say) no-wings to viable wings, where each change could occur by random genetic variation or mutation, and where in order to be selected for, _each_ change must confer a net reproductive advantage on its generation over the previous.

From Wikipedia [1] it looks like we don't have a fully satisfactory evolutionary explanation of flight yet (any more than we have a fully satisfactory evolutionary explanation of _True Blood_ ), but there are several theories all of which are more plausible than waking up one day with wings.

[1] <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Origin_of_avian_flight>

<comment><USER11> As a side note, wings worked so well for survival that most current insect species have them.

<comment><USER16> Dawkins points out that at insect scale, flight isn't particularly interesting: in many environments, tiny organisms would have difficulty _not_ flying. Thus, it may be that wings started as little rudders to control how the wind is blowing you. From that point, it's easy to imagine a gradual evolution to self-powered flight.

But I'm afraid this doesn't help us understand avian and mammalian evolution of flight. The example of the flying squirrel (that can't fly, but can direct his glide) may be a little instructive...

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> I propose something interesting. Create a computer program that has some rules so is able to question whether there is God, and whose answer is We are. Then you can refine the program, when then program is very complex, say it satisfies Turing test, we can think about God with the help of this machine. I think people playing the game Life with its evolving capabilities must have been thinking something along these lines.

</comment><comment><USER17> It should clearly be announced here:

Hawking is doing a really bad job to atheists here: he's becoming as anti- scientific as one can get...

Science has its very defined principles, as they are: they don't have to contradict all of: philosophy, mathematics, physics, (and so on...).

This is a really sad story: he simply seems to be a really sad and angry person (personally, I would be worse, in his actual state...), and this seems to influence all of his excogitations...

</comment><comment><USER18> _it is somewhat more likely that there is a God than that there is not_

[citation needed]

<comment><USER19> I agree with your point, but this isn't really how you do commenting on HN.

I hope that remains true, even with the demise of digg (and therefore, by extension, reddit).

<comment><USER18> Oh, I've been around long enough to know that HNers don't like that sort of comment. Still, I defy you to come up with a more succinct way to get the point across! Besides, what is life if you don't do something stupid once in a while? :)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER20> Heh, it's actually funny because in the bible it states that 'the Word of God holds the universe together'

<comment><USER21> That's a good point. Hawking's argument presupposes a purely natural universal gravitation, the problems with which assumption were exposed several years ago by Burdett et al., as reported here: <[http://www.theonion.com/articles/evangelical-scientists- refu...](http://www.theonion.com/articles/evangelical-scientists-refute- gravity-with-new-int,1778/>);

</comment></comment><comment><USER22> I'm guessing Stephen Hawking has now run out of things to say.

</comment><comment><USER23> > any form of intelligent life that evolves anywhere will automatically find > that it lives somewhere suitable for it.

This is circular reasoning.

I know it's unpopular to question evolution, and this might lose me all the points I gathered in the past three weeks, but,

But this kind of argument assumes that life can and will inevitably evolve spontaneously some where, some how.

It's a tautology.

Sure, there could be a completely different form of intelligent life, in a completely different kind of environment, but that just means that God can and will create any form of life in any kind of environment.

The core question is, can life really evolve spontaneously? I'm sure many will scream "of course yes, duh".

Natural selection doesn't explain anything about how something might evolve, it just says: if you can produce many many good options, the best will survive, and therefore you get optimal design.

Sure, if there are forces that produce new ideas and things, and you can choose the best every step of the way, you'll get something really good. Like if, say, people submit patches to Linux, and they get reviewed and tested, you'll get something that Linus himself couldn't have come up with on his own.

NS is useless if there's nothing that can produce these patches. If you have a really good team of tester and code reviewers, but no one submits any patch (or, no one makes any change), then the software will not evolve on its own. It will not get better just because there are a lot of people to test it. It needs other people to make changes/submit patches.

It's the "mutation" part that tries to explain how new things actually get produced, and I find it ridiculous. Not only does it not fly with me conceptually, I'd say - at the risk of being stoned - that there's no real evidence for it. It's usually just a lot of hand waving as if, "of course mutation can produce many useful things for NS to select from, how dare you object to that?".

Yes, you can observe variations, and you can observe certain variations being selected. Like skin color, or hair type. This is, however, entirely different from observing useful patches being produced by mutations.

 _All_ cited instances of observed NS operate on variations that are already there. This is where hand waving about mutations come in.

Video games can be designed to use a high resolution or low resolution depending on the system specs. It's therefor not surprising when users on low end machines will "select" the low-resolution configuration. There are options to select from, but these options weren't produced by anything remotely resembling a mutation; it's a built-in option that's already available -- nothing new.

No one denies the design; no one, none at all. Neo-Darwinism just says that design can be automated by mutation and natural selection.

It is easy to describe how a complex system works once you discover it; but that doesn't make it any less impressive. I'm often impressed by some of my own programs, despite the fact that, not only do I know exactly how they work, but I even built them myself. Usually when you discover the internals of a system, it gets even more impressive.

<comment><USER24> You're suggesting that there exists an intelligent designer, someone or something that created 'options', as you put it, which then go through the process of natural selection. I, on the other hand, propose that there was no intelligent design, that all the 'options' were created simply through the workings of the laws of nature. Now, somebody might say - but who, then, created these laws, who said that they're going to work the way they do? And that's just the thing - nobody did. It's just the way (our) universe works. No intelligent designer decreed that the speed of light in vacuum will be 299,792,458 metres per second, it's simply one of the laws of physics.

<comment><USER23> I'm not trying to come up with any alternative to anything; just pointing out the _obvious_ problems with "mutations" that everyone seems to ignore.

The design is _obvious_. It doesn't need any proof. No one even denies it. Even the most hard-core atheists I've come across use the word "design" a lot when talking about the human body or even any biological structure.

They just propose that it can be automated in such a simple way that even the deaf and blind nature can do it. I'm pointing out a fatal flaw in a key element of this supposed automatic mechanism.

"We'll find another way" is not really a good answer; not a very scientific one, anyway.

<comment><USER25> The problem is you are not considering the timescale - which is over millions of years. There is no "obvious flaw" in mutation, not if you understand how it works.

 _It is easy to describe how a complex system works once you discover it_

The same can equally be said of the intelligent design theory.

<comment><USER23> I'm not trying to promote the ID "theory" or anything like that. Can't we just focus on the question instead of questioning my motives?

> The problem is you are not considering the timescale - which is over > millions of years.

This is exactly what I mean by hand waving. So there's a humongous timescale involved, so what? That doesn't constitute any form of evidence.

Unless you're saying it's not really testable because we can't simulate millions of years in a lab. In that case, well, you'd be confirming my point.

Again, the design is quite obvious, while the "mutation" proposition is not plausible, and remains unproven.

And no, I don't identify myself as a proponent of " _The_ Intelligent Design Theory". I don't claim to have the definitive answer and I don't feel the need to propose an alternative to neo-darwinism.

<comment><USER25> No, I was saying that the apparent problems you see in mutation is due to the fact that you don't seem to be considering the huge time-scale involved.

Saying "design is obvious" is all very well but I see lots of flaws with that? Who's right?

:)

<comment><USER23> It seems you don't understand what I'm talking about.

Having a long time is only useful if mutations can produce good "patches". If you can't prove that they can, then all the time in the world won't do you any good.

It's like you're saying:

A & B & C & D, therefor Z

I'm pointing out that A is false. You're objecting by pointing out that B is true. I'm saying "who cares"?

When one of your basic premises doesn't hold, it doesn't matter if all the other ones hold.

<comment><USER25> I'm somewhat confused by your argument (actually; entirely confused). Perhaps a quick refresher of Evolution is useful.

Basically there is a wide misconception that mutation and NS _is_ Evolution. This is something of a well taught fallacy.

Evolution consists of three parts - Variation, Mechanism and Outcome. The first of these, Variation, relates to the physical phenomena that cause changes in organisms. One of these is mutation; which is a random action at the _gene level_ causing something different to occur in the organism. There are several other things that can cause variation in an organism.

The second is Mechanism; which is the process by which individual variations take effect across a "population". This is, in effect, the guts of evolution - and one of the main parts of that is Natural selection (which is an easy theory to comprehend). The thing to remember about NS is that this is a very very slow process; if one variation is favoured this is not a process that occurs from one generation to the next. NS works best in larger populations - so the progress of multiple variations through the population can take hundreds, or thousands, of generations.

The final part of Evolution is the outcome of the progress of variations across a species; this is more about the phenomena we observe (i.e. that we are adapted to our environment, or that two species "co-operate" at a very basic level). This is the guts of your particular problem. Mutation is a pretty provable phenomena because, well, we see mutation all the time!

Your original post made this note:

 _If you have a really good team of tester and code reviewers, but no one submits any patch (or, no one makes any change), then the software will not evolve on its own. It will not get better just because there are a lot of people to test it. It needs other people to make changes/submit patches._

Consider a more "true to life" version of your example; a program exists that can compile and produce a version of itself as well as doing some other specific task. People download V1 of this program that, say, flashes a pixel on your screen. As the program compiles itself a random "mutation" may occur in the code - adding, removing or changing something. Programs that don't work are discarded (naturally) and those that do something extra or cool are favoured. Over the course of millions of generations you will end up with a number of highly evolved programs - for example a network scanner, a web browser and a word pad.

Your mistake is in assuming a system that requires an intelligent input.

You seem to be suggesting that it is unlikely for mutation to create useful variations; this is also a fallacy because mutation is random. So despite being unlikely it is not impossible; please remember we are not talking about a mutation that suddenly means the offspring grows a lung - that is a common misconception. We are already highly evolved over millions of generations - <USER2> it is a lot harder to observe directly in current organisms. But we can observe it in bacteria who adapt to new situations through mutation. That is the basis of the whole shebang.

The theory of evolution has survived this challenge a number of times without being proven fallacious.

<comment><USER23> I think I know what I'm talking about. Please refrain from assuming I'm basing my argument on some misconceptions unless you clearly see that.

NS is a process for selecting changes. It doesn't introduce any change. NS does not produce variations. If NS produced variations then it would be sufficient on its own, and no one would go looking for other causes of variation, such as mutations. NS is not the guts of evolution, it's only a part of it, and by itself it is useless.

This is actually a testable statement.

If NS by itself is sufficient for producing variations _and_ selecting them, no one would go looking for some other source of variation.

From what I understand, Darwin himself didn't think too much of explaining where variations come from; they seemed to occur naturally, so it doesn't matter where they come from. This doesn't work anymore, so people had to actually think and fill this gap.

The guts of evolution, really, is producing variations. For evolution is nothing but the progression of species by having small variations accumulate over a long time.

NS without variations to choose from will do absolutely nothing to advance the cause of evolving any species.

The patching/test analogy works great, I don't know why it didn't make sense to you.

NS by itself doesn't do anything, for the same reason that testing by itself doesn't actually develop anything.

Suppose you have two teams, team A and team B. Team B does nothing but testing. They test and test and test, and they only accept something of good quality, and no code makes it into production unless it's passed the testing by team B. Team A do the actual development, they use a decentralized version control system, and every change is made into its own branch, and it's then sent to team B to be tested.

Team B doesn't by itself make anything; they only accept or reject changes done by team A. If team A doesn't send any changes to team B, the software will not evolve.

Similarly, NS can only select variations, it doesn't produce them.

Is that analogy really hard to understand?

There has to be some other forces that create these variations, and the proposed idea is that these variations are caused by random mutations.

What tends to happen in evolutionary literature is, the role of NS is magnified, and the role of mutations is marginalized, as if it's the selection process that matters, not the variation-producing process.

The mere occurrence of mutations is not the subject of my argument.

The part that is often overlooked, even though it is so crucial, is the lack of evidence for whether mutations have the ability to actually produce any useful set of variations for NS to act on.

It's assumed that eventually mutations will always produce something useful, but this is a claim that lacks evidence.

This is the heart of evolution; the mechanism that produce these small changes that eventually accumulate.

This is ten times more significant that NS.

Darwin focused on NS so much, but that's because he assumed that NS is the force that drives the variations. It's as if competition would motivate individual animals to better adapt themselves to their environment, by extending their necks, and things like that. He even talks a lot about the competition! If you really think about it, he's making an analogy with market competition: market competition drives people to provide better services/products. The fact that people will make better product is not so important, because they always can, but who's to force them? If a crappy product sells, you won't be motivated to improve it. Competition forces you to improve your products.

Darwin must have thought the same about natural selection: it doesn't matter where variations come from, they just naturally occur.

This is where neo-darwinism comes in. It says, no no, that doesn't really work. Variations come from mutations.

Once you say that, NS stops becoming so important, and the mechanism that produces the variations becomes much more important.

Natural variations in the gene pool (like hair color) _cannot_ contribute to evolution, because they always revolve around a closed circle.

Suppose I have 3 options for hair, each option having 5 possible choices:

* color: white, black, red, yellow, blue * type: straight1, straight2, curly1, curly2, curly3 * length: really-short, short, medium, long, really-long

That's 5^3 possible variations right there. It's really easy to imagine having more such options. You can have 20 trivial options, each having 2 choices. That would be about a million possible variation (2^20). You can try to mix and match any number of configuration for these options, but it would never result in a new species even after a billion years.

The only mechanism for actually creating new kinds of variations that _can_ lead to the evolution of new species is mutation.

As for your self-replicating pixel-drawing program that can evolve to a web browser -- you are more than welcome to have a go at it. I can tell you from now that it will fail. There's a simpler experiment, that will also fail: <http://www.randommutation.com/darwinianevolution.htm>

> You seem to be suggesting that it is unlikely for mutation to create useful > variations; this is also a fallacy because mutation is random. So despite > being unlikely it is not impossible

Yet another instance of hand waving. You might think it is possible, but until you prove it, I will claim that this is an unscientific claim.

> remember we are not talking about a mutation that suddenly means the > offspring grows a lung - that is a common misconception.

I never suggested that a single mutation must produce a lung.

This is a common technique. I might call it "The argument from you don't really understand".

I think you're the one who's not understanding my argument.

Suppose complex feature X requires 100 steps to come about. Each step is a tiny change in something that already exists, but after a 100 steps, it will be basically transformed into X. Each such step must be producible by a mutation. Not only that, but each step must be advantageous enough to be selected by NS.

(Notice how NS here actually makes things more difficult).

A small example: the word "yellow" can be transformed to "hello" by two steps:

yellow -> hellow -> hello

The problem here is, "hellow" is not a valid word, and therefore NS would fail it, and this chain of variations will not work.

Of course this example doesn't exactly apply to genes, but it clearly illustrates two points:

\- Each "tiny step" must be producible by a random mutation \- Each such step must pass NS.

Now, from reading the brain-simulation thread the other day, I sort of conclude that no one really knows what these steps might even look like, because genetic engineering is really hard, and the way genes translate to features is still largely a mystery.

> The theory of evolution has survived this challenge a number of times > without being proven fallacious.

Not really.

Of course, you will ignore everything I'm saying, because instead of focusing on evidence and logic, you're fixated on the notion that I'm an idiot (or misinformed) and therefore my argument is obviously false. I mean, how dare I question evolution? Right?

<comment><USER25> > As for your self-replicating pixel-drawing program that can evolve to a web > browser -- you are more than welcome to have a go at it. I can tell you from > now that it will fail. There's a simpler experiment, that will also fail: > <http://www.randommutation.com/darwinianevolution.htm>

That's a flawed example for several reasons. The main one is that the selection is based on a target (the new word) or is considered over too short a timespan. Even worse is that you are getting random variation in every generation, which is actually against the principle of evolution. In your cited example the whole chain would die out very quickly - favouring chains that mutated more slowly.

My example is better because the end product is irrelevant; the code becomes a program. Programs that are "better" in some ambiguous way will be used more frequently. Over time the most useful programs will evolve; but only over millions of generations. The end product is uncertain; but according to Darwinian theory it would fit the environment (so, if we had no internet there would be no network scanner to evolve).

> Yet another instance of hand waving. You might think it is possible, but > until you prove it, I will claim that this is an unscientific claim.

I'm sorry but what is unprovable about mutation; this is one of the aspects we have observed! Both at a cellular and DNA level.

> The part that is often overlooked, even though it is so crucial, is the lack > of evidence for whether mutations have the ability to actually produce any > useful set of variations for NS to act on.

Most of your argument seems based on the idea that a mutation can produce a change/feature - but that it cannot be shown empirically that good changes/features have or can occur. This does not seem logical at all; you are basically arguing that it is impossible to a random mutation to have a positive effect on the offspring. This is incorrect; the mutation inarguably, as you agree, can produce a change - so at some point a positive change must occur (even if it is entirely unlikely).

As I am sure you appreciate; subtle improvements take a long time to take effect. That we exist in this form _is_ highly improbable - but that is not dis-proof of the theory.

Please bear in mind I am just trying to be helpful here - not making any criticism of how informed you are. However you do not appear to be schooled in Darwinian theory because:

> Darwin focused on NS so much, but that's because he assumed that NS is the > force that drives the variations.

Is 100% counter to what Evolution says.

> If you really think about it, he's making an analogy with market competition

He's not. In the slightest. He is making an empirical observation that animal survival is related to competing with others. NS is the process by which organisms with inheritable mutations that favour them survive longer and slowly mix their genes into the species.

The process of stacking mutations in sequence to achieve what we are today is complex and highly unlikely; but not impossible. That is the point Evolution makes. I don't see a counter explanation with such solid theory, that is all.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER26> If evolution is such a obvious theory as to be taken as fact, then why are there no species obviously evolving into another?

According to the theory, millions of years ago Chimps evolved into humans. Why then are there no chimps in a stage of evolving that would signify a progression to a different species? They've had millions of years to do so...

<comment><USER27> How do you know there aren't any?

<comment><USER26> Surely if they did, they'd be widely referenced and be irrefutable?

My point is, evolution is a theory, which cannot be proved even by its most hardened supporters. There is more gray here than you would seem to admit.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER28> >"The 'god' that Stephen Hawking is trying to debunk is not the creator God of the Abrahamic faiths who really is the ultimate explanation for why there is something rather than nothing," said Denis Alexander.

Wrong.</comment>


Which Douglas Adams Character Represents Your DevOps Skills? - <AUTHOR> https://medium.com/@XebiaLabs/which-douglas-adams-character-represents-your-devops-skills-4857cab9a554#.3iwe8sd4m <comment><USER2> The original post is at [http://blog.xebialabs.com/2016/01/06/which-douglas- adam-char...](http://blog.xebialabs.com/2016/01/06/which-douglas-adam- character-represents-your-devops-skills/) . The HN guidelines suggest "Please submit the original source."

FWIW, these are "Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy" characters. If you think you're more a Dirk Gently, then you're out of luck.

FWIW#2, I know someone who inspired the "Dave" character in Salmon of Doubt. For him, the answer is easy.</comment>


Ask HN: Can blockchain allow full privacy Covid-19 tracing? - <AUTHOR> The current plan for bluetooth covid-19 contact tracing sounds a little bit creepy to me(but better than nothing. They generally have two components:
1. A decentralized part storing on our devices (anonymously) who we've been in contact with 2. A state-run centralized system to contact people once someone had been infected<p>Sounds to me blockchain could allow the second part (and the whole system) to be more/fully decentralized, with more/total privacy…
What do you thing ? <comment><AUTHOR> A (non-specialist) idea of architecture :

\- If you are more than X minutes at less than 2 meters of someone, you get a unique address from this person (like for any blockchain transaction), stored in your smartphone.

\- If your are infected (after validation by a doctor?), you just send the info (like a normal transaction) to all the relevant "unique addresses" stored in your phone

\- Using existing blockchain (and a modified version of their open source wallet) to do these simple transaction, with existing coin (eg. using OP- RETURN) or by creating a specific token. Monero would be interesting (obscures sender and recipient) for the privacy side. Less private, but I like Komodo too...

Nothing stored in the blockchain. No smart contract, no gas cost, nothing complex, using existing tech and open source code...

</comment><comment><USER2> Probably not a great idea because:

1\. Replacing a DB/server side code with contracts that you pay to run per opcode introduces needless cost (this is general problem with startups that use blockchain too quickly). Sure AWS compute costs money, but smart contracts are way more expensive.

2\. If you're building an app and distributing it via Apple/Google, there's no need for a blockchain. Plus the app store itself is already centralized, so if your distribution channel is centralized there's really no guarantee of privacy.

3\. Ethereum/<pick your favorite blockchain> txs are slow compared to HTTP requests. We're talking minutes to confirm sometimes, versus less than 100s of milliseconds.

4\. If you increase privacy, you must be increasing anonymity, and that's not useful for contact tracing. You need to know who was in contact with who else.

5\. Smart contract code is a pain to upgrade. It's costly, complicated, and puts all your "server-side" code right on the blockchain for anyone to mess with it and try and break it.

<comment><AUTHOR> Thank you for your insight. My (non specialist) answers:

1\. It is possibly be a (little) bit more expensive to run, but the cost must be compared with the potential gain: more privacy, and more adoption thanks to privacy (=less cost for treating COV-19). I think cost can be decreased by using existing blockchain infrastructure, and using a gas-free design.

2\. If we can achieve much higher privacy without blockchain, I am happy with it, I just never seen any proposal! Crypto-wallet are available on app stores, but still guarantee decentralization and anonymity/pseudonymity

3\. Speed is not key here. Knowing now or in 2 minutes that you have been in contact with someone with COV-19 does not seem to be game changing

4\. My understanding is you need to know if you have been in contact with someone having the COV-19. But you don't need anything else, and health system does not need to know your name or other info

5\. If it is a pain in the neck but allow better privacy and more tracing app usage seems a reasonable trade off to me. Furthermore I think that it possible to do a design without smart contract.

<comment><USER3> 1\. You don't see this from a layman's perspective: a person who hardly understands Bitcoin never mind blockchain. _You_ may realise the privacy improvements in such a solution. The average laymen will not. How can you expect trust, as far as privacy goes, when people can't even understand how that privacy is guaranteed? The media, who could simplify and spread, have very low trust ratings according to recent surveys on the coronavirus crisis. Trust in almost all organisations, including central governments, has went up - the largest exception was the media.

On a sidenote: Governments haven't played around with blockchain enough to be able to rapidly develop and deploy such a feature using blockchain technology. Then they'd probably run into lots of bugs and hurdles on release.

Not good when you need to increase public trust, adoption, and deploy effective solutions rapidly.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> Why do you think that? How would you use the blockchain to achieve that?

Also, what does "full privacy" mean? The goal of such a system is by definition partiall compromising privacy, by revealing information.

<comment><AUTHOR> Blockchain allows to send stuff pseudonymously (bitcoin, ethereum, komodo…) or anonymously (monero, Zcash, pirates...), and allow to get a decentralized system, with high level of privacy and control. Seems to me that can be useful for a more privacy in the contact tracing system, especially for contacting people at risk... But I am no specialist, maybe people in HN could share their expertise...

<comment><USER5> The true anonymity is not actually near where people think they are, even on the purpose built for.

So in many ways, block chain is less anonymous because the true data set is provided to the public. They do data science, connect dots, an de-anonymize the wallets.

<comment><AUTHOR> In general I do agree with you; here I think it is different, with 2 different options.

1\. You can use Monero like blockchain

2\. What's allowing to de-anonymize wallet is the multiple transaction you do, especially the transaction linked to the real word (eg. stuff with KYC or with your someone's postal address). Here this could be a "wallet" that only send or receive info from other "covid wallet" without link to real life info, and with only very few transaction (when you have covid, or are at risk). That reduces the risk of de-anonymization

<comment><USER5> 1\. Monero anonymity has been subverted in multiple cases

2\. How does the fiat get in or out? That's where anonymity breaks with anything blockchain

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> Storing contacts on people's devices in a private way is trivial (just use an unique ID, and that's probably the way apps that trace through Bluetooth beaconing work), but the point is that the list of contacts may be identified by the authorities if and when needed.

We don't want something that only allows people to be notified on their devices without anyone knowing who they are. We want to know exactly who the contacts are.

Back to your question: It's not clear to me what blockchain has to do with this, anyway.

<comment><AUTHOR> "We don't want something that only allows people to be notified on their devices without anyone knowing who they are. We want to know exactly who the contacts are"

Why???

And even if you want the authorities to get specific names and contacts (which I don't understand the usage of it), a system giving those name while not revealing with whom s.he had been in contact with would be good.

More you have privacy, easier it gets to convince people to opt-in.

Monero or Pirates blockchains allows you to do some transaction while obscuring sender, recipient and amount of the transaction... Seems an inspiration to get more privacy for tracing app

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> The privacy concerns you're pointing out can be overcome even without Blockchain. I am not sure I understand the use of blockchain here, even though I would be really happy to use one if I see a benefit.

Let's say we use a blockchain to store these user data in a decentralized way. Now, how will blocks get created (new blocks added) in the chain? How are you planning to get a consensus? Who decides?

<comment><AUTHOR> If there is no need of blockchain, then it would be "stupid" to use blockchain, as it tend to be more complex and inefficient.

However all the design I came through included a state-run centralized database to contact people who have been in contact with someone having the covid, and generally gets access to the info of which covid-positive person you have been in contact with... How would design a system including more privacy ?

My feeling is you don't necessarily need to store anything on the blockchain. If you are more than Xminutes at less than 2 meter of someone, you get a unique address from this person. Then you just use the unique addresses of all the people to send them the info that you have the covid (after validation by a doctor?). That could use existing blockchain to do these simple transaction, with existing coin (eg. using OP-RETURN) or by creating a specific token. Monero would be interesting for the privacy side. Less private, but I like Komodo too.

</comment></comment><comment><USER8> No. Blockchain is for an immutable forever docket. That's the opposite of privacy.

<comment><AUTHOR> A good Monero wallet gives you more privacy than any bank...</comment></comment>


Longevity scientists launch academy to raise profile of life-extending research - <AUTHOR> https://www.bostonglobe.com/business/2019/02/11/longevity-scientists-launch-academy-raise-profile-life-extending-research/c0QSLxNOApnyRwKqui0YzO/story.html <comment><USER2> Will all the research be posted publicly on Pubmed? I have watched a few interviews on Youtube with David and found them to be lacking details, despite being very interesting topics.</comment>


Ask HN: What do you use to buy a house/condo? - <AUTHOR>

1.  What's your preferred method for finding a new house, condo, or apartment?  MLS, Kijiji/Craigslist, Grapevine, other?<p>2.  What are your top three and bottom three considerations when looking for a purchase or rental? (cost, neighbourhood, schools, proximity to transit, restaurants, etc) <comment><USER2> CribQ - <http://sfbay.cribq.com/>

There are other cities it handles (choose the drop down) but it defaults to sfbay (for me) and remembers your subdomain. Anyway, its a cool google map, craiglist, route, list planner mashup a friend made.

There'a an iPhone app for it too.

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks for the reference

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> I usually use Craigslist or recommendations from people I know who live where I'm moving to.

My number one requirement is FiOS or service with a similar upload and download rates. Rent and the kind of neighborhood are the other two important factors for me.

</comment><comment><USER4> Get a good agent. They can be very valuable.

</comment><comment><USER5> 1\. Location 2\. Cost 3\. Parking (I live in a fairly active city)

</comment><comment><USER6> would rent be applicable here?

<comment><AUTHOR> Sure would if monthly carrying costs are applicable</comment></comment>


Ask HN: Medicine/drugs you wish existed? - <AUTHOR> Title.
I'm particularly interested in (-)-BPAP (and its weaker relative PPAP), a drug that apparently increases catecholamine/serotonin transmission, rather than just dumping neurotransmitters from vesicles/reversing the transport protein's neurotranmsitter flow. i.e. selective dopamine/norepinephrine/serotonin release enhancement. <comment><USER2> antihistamines that don't make you feel loopy or predispose you to alzheimers.</comment>


Bitlock replaces your bike key with your phone - <AUTHOR> http://bitlock.co <comment><USER2> Cute, but seems like a solution looking for a problem, and finding the wrong one.

The major problem with bike locks IMHO is their laughable resistance to brute force physical attacks, e.g. $100 hydraulic cutters. I don't think anyone around here bothers with picking the actual lock.

<comment><USER3> _I don 't think anyone around here bothers with picking the actual lock._

True in general, but for a time one could pick Kryptonites with a Bic pen.

<comment><USER4> And similarly efficient attacks for current gen disc detainer based bike locks are on the horizon.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> Did these guys think about the bike lock market at all when they created this? Why reinvent the wheel? For bike locks people value security and convenience. This offers neither over standard key locks.

I'm a cyclist. Why would I want to mess with an electro lock when all I want to do is get on my bike and ride? This seems a symptom of 'an app for everything' syndrome.

<comment><AUTHOR> As a consumer product, BitLock is targeting a niche market (like any other keyless locks). It is way more convenient than a regular lock. You don't have to carry a key with you plus the interaction is seamless. Also we never have to deal with lost bike keys. However an important side application for this lock is bike sharing. For example, You can setup a bike share system among your friends on college campus. This you can't do with regular locks.

<comment><USER5> I really don't see that happening on a campus. If I'm going to setup a bike share, I'm not going to leave the bikes outside locked in a public place.

Second, keys are pretty fucking convenient. What exactly is the downside of keys?

Finally, you should disclose that this is your project when commenting on it.

<comment><AUTHOR> * Finally, you should disclose that this is your project when commenting on it.

I apologize about that. I kind of assume it was clear but thanks for the reminder.

If you want to share bikes, hand-off of keys will be an issue. With BitLock for example you can share 3 bikes between 10 people. with the app on your phone you can geolocate bikes and lock/unlock easily.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> Interesting to read this juxtaposed with the article on increased smartphone theft in what also happen to be cities with high populations of cyclists.

In my personal infrastructure and gear, I like redundancies that create soft modes of failure. The more we make the smartphone into a security hub (or a payment hub), the greater the cost & inconvenience of theft, loss, or damage of the device. Spreading these functions between phone, wallet, and keychain is a healthy "division of labor" that spreads failure risk.

E.G., you can steal my wallet, and you can steal my phone, but I'm still safely biking home from the bar because you didn't steal my keys.

However, yes please to more convenient bike locks. Just not increasing/concentrating device dependency and risk.

<comment><USER7> I kind of want to build a boobietrap into this. You steal my bike, the bikelock detects it and triggers a timer, the person starts riding the bike and BOOM his ass explodes. Then I can program my stolen phone to point to my bike so the boobietrap can be sprung. Oh it will be awful and awesome.

</comment></comment><comment><USER8> Just what I need, for my phone to be dead at the end of the night and not only can't I call a friend to get a ride home, can't unlock my apartment, and now I can't unlock my bike either.

<comment><AUTHOR> The battery life issue of smart phone is coming to an end. Basically battery life will be the prime feature of competition for smartphone makers from now on. Wireless charging, better battery technologies, and etc means the probability of your phone dying on you is going to decrease considerably over the next few years.

<comment><USER8> Take your argument back to 2005, it still holds. And it didn't happen. Doesn't mean the bar I'm at has a charger or that I'm going to remember to charge my phone when I'm out and about doing whatever I do (movies, golf, bar, board gaming, lan party).

The failure case is still terrible and consists of me with a hacksaw at 3am on the side of the road "Stealing" my own bike.

<comment><AUTHOR> In 2005 there were not as many smart phone out there as day. Plus we are getting more and more dependent on your smartphone. We use it for calls, navigation, emails, not to mention facebooking! soon it will be your wallet as well. So this creates a lot of pressure as well as incentives for smart phone makers to get ahead of competition of things like battery life. Note that innovation in smart phones has almost died. Apple is struggle to innovate (still they are doing some stuff with fingerprint scanner, motion processors,...) but the next big thing for them will be the battery life in terms of hardware innovation.

a final note, the battery innovation does not even have to be that much of a breakthrough. if your phone lives for a couple of days on a single charge, then the probability of running out of battery will decrease dramatically (since most people charge at least once every two days).

<comment><USER8> The pressure is to make the phones more powerful to do more with teh instegrahms, not to have longer battery life. If it were we wouldn't have gone from month long standby times (Nokia 5xxx) to partial day battery life (any modern phone with everything turned on). You can argue it all you want but battery is not growing faster much as our hunger for screen size, processing power, network use, memory, gps, etc are. Anything we can squeeze out of a battery will get gobbled up for quite a while.

Feel free to use something like this. It's geeky cool. I've just been burned by things like not being able to contact my ride from the airport, or my phone randomly deciding that it's just too dead to turn on at 8%, that I'm not trusting it for keys to my transportation / apartment.

For those things, if they have battery, like say my apartment combo lock, I want things with a good battery life (in the years) for the whole thing, a good failure state that I will always have on me (a combo), and obvious notification EARLY when the battery is going low.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> It would be good if this was available as a permanent fixture at bike racks. Because it would be static you could use higher strength heavier materials that would stand up to an angle grinder. The big problem for a lot of cyclists is hauling heavy locks around. A keyless static lock would solve this.

<comment><USER10> Interesting idea, but I wouldn't expect it to work out well for long. It would probably require a lot of regular maintenance, and if one breaks down while your bike is on it, you would be screwed until a tech with the master mechanical key comes to rescue you... which might then also make them liable if you locked a stolen bike there...

</comment></comment><comment><USER11> Lose your phone? Phone out of juice? There goes your ride. Someone steal your phone? Now they have your bike. Combo locks are the best locks.

</comment><comment><USER12> Hmm interesting idea, but you are definitely not the first mover, and probably someone else already has a patent on it, when did you file? There has been others doing the same for a while. I have been waiting for someone to properly execute this but everybody that tries ends up showing a video and 3d printed mockups. Just to give you an idea:

[http://www.indiegogo.com/projects/haamlock-a-smarter-bike- lo...](http://www.indiegogo.com/projects/haamlock-a-smarter-bike-lock) [http://www.smartbikelock.com/](http://www.smartbikelock.com/) [http://www.indiegogo.com/projects/social-lock-developers- kit...](http://www.indiegogo.com/projects/social-lock-developers-kit-the-kit- that-helps-you-build-your-own-smart-lock)

<comment><USER13> I was at a y combinator hardware hackathon in march and a Stanford team was doing something similar as well. Probably they have a patent on it.

<comment><USER12> So was I. I think that team was from Berkeley though.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> What sort of locking mechanism will be used? I live in Canada and ride my bike all year round, in the rain, snow, sleet, below freezing temperatures, etc. Sometimes I have to leave my bike outside during the winter. I've had trouble opening my key operated lock before when it froze in the middle of the night... luckily I was able to get it open with rubbing alcohol and chain lube after about 20 minutes.

I'd be worried that this thing won't handle the weather, especially if its only battery operated (no key).

<comment><AUTHOR> original poster here: all of the internal electronic components are water proofed and the battery operates under extended temperatures (currently the same batteries are used in north pole for remote sensing)

But if the water freezes inside and prevents the actuator from moving, then the lock won't work. the same can happen to the mechanical locks...if the water gets into the key hole and freezes there or freezes up the locking mechansim

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> I'm wondering if successful attacks on this lock (should it get popular enough to warrant it) will lead to successful attacks on similar technology on homes.

There is an impressive amount of innovation when it comes to stealing bikes as they are low-risk, decent-value targets compared to cars or houses. In the past, attacks that originated with or were popularized on bike locks have paved the way for attacks on other locks that protected cars & electronics.

</comment><comment><USER14> What's the advantage over a traditional lock?

<comment><USER15> One less key to carry, I imagine. Practically speaking, I wouldn't really mind having my wallet and keys integrated with my smartphone. It is the security implications that make me uneasy.

<comment><USER14> Sure. It seems like this is taking a problem space (physical security) and adding complexity by introducing another problem space (digital security), while further increasing my dependence on my phone.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> This could also easily enable a small scale bike sharing scheme (among trusted people). In order to keep track of where each bike is, the phone app could update the position to shared map when the lock is activated.

<comment><AUTHOR> original poster: exactly! that's the main point. This is designed to enable for small scaled bike share systems. you can share the location and access of bikes with a (close or open) group of people. As the owner of the lock, you set the terms. you can also assign people as admins so they can also manage permissions.

</comment></comment><comment><USER17> Is lock/unlock going to use some kind of OTP, or would the same communication happen over BT everytime? Just thinking about how easily this could be cracked by malicious people near you and your bike.

<comment><USER18> If Eve wants to steal Bob's bike Eve is going to buy a pair of bolt cutters before fucking around trying to find Alice and Bob's shared secret.

Even though Bruce Schneier could probably break that lock just by looking at it, he's probably not going to become a bike thief.

[http://xkcd.com/538/](http://xkcd.com/538/)

</comment></comment><comment><USER19> I've been waiting for something like this-- with the right implementation it could be a huge success-- but there's lots of room to get it not-quite-right.

<comment><AUTHOR> We have been working on this for about a year.

Basically, the biggest technical and design challenge was the battery life.

We wanted to make the lock in a way that the user does not have to charge the lock/battery nor has to worry about replacing the battery at least for a couple of years.

To accomplish that, we had to look across all of the components that consume power. On the radio side, bluetooth LE solved that problem for us. Since we are sending data in bursts and the amount of data transferred is so little, the radio power consumption is almost negligible. We also use an ultra low power micro-controller with intelligent power management to low power consumption when the lock is not in use. The biggest power sucker was the mechanical actuation system. So that became more of a mechanical design and engineering problem. Using a solenoid was our of equation. There are extremely inefficient. We design the lock so that the actuator movement is minimal and is driven by a very low power motor. However there was one last issue. Most of the off-the-shelf batteries leak energy and deplete even if you are not using them after a 1-2 years. We are now using an advance lithium battery technology that has a very high energy density as well as very low leakage rate (This technology is commonly used to power sensors in remote sensing and telemetry application)

Eventually when the battery level drops low after a few years, you can notification on your phone and you can then replace the battery.

<comment> slash-dot Since the lock will probably be in motion when not not in use, couldn't you just use some kind of kinetic charging mechanism to charge the battery? Is kinetic charging not enough powerful? Or is the circuitry too complex?

<comment><USER20> Maybe store some mechanical energy in a spring to help reduce the amount of "stuff" that needs to be moved just by the battery?

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER21> 1\. Is it more hackable than classic lock? 2\. What if my battery dies? No biking for me then? :D

<comment><AUTHOR> 1 - Compared to picking a lock, hacking AES-128 is lot more difficult :D 2 - The battery last up to 5 years on average usage (lock&unlock 5 times a day) + you get a notification on your phone when it is time to replace the battery.

<comment><USER22> The physical security (especially the release mechanism) is what I'm curious about. Elsewhere you mention the constraints low-power places on you, and it strikes me that the less energy required to trigger the release, the easier that might be to fake with bumping or vibratory attacks.

There were a couple of interesting DEFCON videos I've seen on electronic safes, which are a similar niche, and quite a lot of them were utterly trivial to open.

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vIJFQO4DIxw](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vIJFQO4DIxw) is one, trying to find the other, which I vaguely recall was from Barnaby Jack.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER23> Just don't forget to charge your phone or you'll be walking home..

</comment><comment><USER24> I've thought about this problem a lot, and was thinking about building something similar. This idea is essentially Lockitron, except it's more mobile (both w.r.t the door/bike, and to w.r.t. its physical location). That mucks with two things: a) the lock isn't attached to the bike, like a Lockitron is attached to its door, and b) the lock doesn't have 24/7 data access, unlike most Lockitrons.

a) makes it far less convenient to unlock. Sure, the lock might unlock itself when I'm near it, but then what happens? Does the lock just fall to the ground? Do I still have to remove the lock from my bike? If so, how is this better than a combination lock?

b) makes it impossible to unlock remotely. Sure, it's great that I can tell my friends the exact location of my bike, but what's the purpose of that if I can't unlock it for them from afar? They still need my phone (effectively physical presence) before they can unlock and use my bike. If I had a combination lock, I could just tell them my passcode and they would be off. Why not just a combination lock?

These two problems make it unappetizing for customers. There seem to be a few main reasons why you have a Lockitron: 1) to go through the door without fishing your keys out or fudging with the lock, 2) so you can let other people in when you're not there, and 3) to know when people entered your house. In fact, these are pretty much the exact reasons Lockitron touts on its website: [https://lockitron.com/preorder](https://lockitron.com/preorder).

If a) and b) are true, most of the above three points have been not been addressed. 1) is a direct result of assumption a), and 2) and 3) are direct results of assumption b).

These problems aren't insurmountable, though. For a), some locks are physically attached to the bike. Here's an example of one: [http://lovelybike.blogspot.com/2011/02/is-wheel-lock- useful-...](http://lovelybike.blogspot.com/2011/02/is-wheel-lock-useful- feature.html). That way, when you walk up to the bike, it unlocks itself, and when you walk away, it locks itself. There's no need for any physical interaction between you and the lock. For b), you could include a cellular modem [1], which would allow you to remotely unlock your bike. Even more important, however, would be the added benefit of being able to track your bike if it were to be stolen (since with a "cafe lock" like the one I linked above, somebody could very well just carry it off).

1\. The problem is trying to find a suitable data plan. The ideal one would be pay per kilobyte, with the SIM lasting forever. Since unlock and location requests take up very little bandwidth, you could pay a small amount, like $10, for a few megabytes. That should be enough for quite a few requests.

<comment><USER25> No data plan is needed. You can implement something similar to two factor auth tokens. Then the phones only need to know the correct token to present to the lock.

<comment><USER26> Or public key crypto. You sign a message that grants your friends phone access; the lock verifies it.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER27> And now they will steal your bike _and_ your bike lock.

<comment><AUTHOR> If someone manages to steal your bike, they probably damage the lock to get it. In case someone steals your lock or you lose your lock, you can disable it remotely.

<comment><USER28> But am I notified when that happens?

<comment><AUTHOR> Original Poster: Unfortunately no. because the lock has no direct data connection. Besides, it will probably too late by the time you get to your bike...unless you are very close by.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER29> Could the screenshot on that iPhone look any more imposed?

<comment><AUTHOR> original poster here: please wait till the kickstarter launch. it's happening very soon. all that information will be on our kickstarter page.

</comment></comment><comment><USER30> Is there anything more to the site than a sign-up form? :(

<comment><AUTHOR> We are launching on Kickstarter soon. Please stay tuned. Meanwhile feel free to shoot me an email with any question you have! email@example.com</comment></comment>


Iran halts oil sales to Britain and France - Tim-Boss http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-17089953

<comment><AUTHOR> As the EU states had already agreed to stop importing Iranian crude, this seems like aimless sabre-rattling. It does cut off the window that some countries had to find alternative oil sources, though. Forgive my armchair analysis, but might this help Britain's economy, as the Mediterranean countries which relied on Iranian oil might now be interested in North Sea oil?

<comment><USER2> The UK is a net oil importer now, so I don't think so.

<comment><AUTHOR> Oh, thanks. Are there any net oil exporters left among the Western European countries? I was under the impression that the most productive oil fields in Western Europe were in UK waters.

<comment><USER2> I'm not an expert in North Sea Oil, but I expect Norway is still an net oil exporter. (I don't know whether they count as West European according to your definition.)</comment></comment></comment></comment>


Rubinius wants to help you make Ruby better - <AUTHOR> http://www.engineyard.com/blog/2010/rubinius-wants-to-help-you-make-ruby-better/ <comment><USER2> Once again reminding people to be careful about how they interpret the LSP:

[http://www.reddit.com/r/programming/comments/7zy40/writing_u...](http://www.reddit.com/r/programming/comments/7zy40/writing_unit_tests_is_reinventing_functional/c07w5bx)

</comment><comment><USER3> IMO the authors understanding of the LSP is incorrect. The way he uses it ANY change would be invalid, for example adding a new method would change the property of "raises AttributeError when attempting to access XYZ" (in Python parlance).

<comment><USER4> What you are criticizing isn't the author's understanding of the Liskov Substitution Principle. It is Barbara Liskov's attempt to formalize the Liskov Substitution Principle.

I dare say that she knows her own intent better than you do. It is also unsurprising if her formulation is imperfect.

In a practical world what the LSP means is that you should be able to replace an object of a given type with another object of any subtype and it should still work. If it doesn't, then that wasn't really a subtype. As you correctly pointed out, the challenge in dynamic languages with exception handling is that it is possible to write code that depends on a particular method not existing. Similar code in C++ would give a compilation error. Therefore no subtype can quite be perfect in some languages.

Still even though perfection is impossible, it is good to be aware of the principle, and adhere to it as closely as is practical. Meaning make your changes be one that will break the smallest amount of code that your code change is likely to encounter at any point in the future.</comment></comment>


Ask HN: Help me chose a name for my business - <AUTHOR>

I'm starting a small business and I need to create a business card and name for my business to hand out to people. The business is mainly an automotive parts distributor. I'm selling fluids, oil, and things like that.Think less actual physical automotive "hardware" and more of stuff like oil filters and sparkplugs and break fluids. 1. Where can I get business cards for cheap? Should I go to a physical store or do it online? 2. What are things I should consider when creating the business cards. 3. What are the things I should consider when choosing my business's name? Any other tips would be highly appreciated, thanks HN! <comment><USER2> If you're in the midst of starting a new business and your biggest concern is business cards, you're prioritizing wrong.

To answer your questions:

1) Who cares? It's trivial. If the expense of the business cards is enough to trip you up, you've got bigger problems to focus on.

2) Double-check the spelling. (You misspelled "brake fluid" above.)

3) Choose a name that will resonate with your customers. Make sure it's easy to say and spell. And, try to get one with an available domain name.

<comment><AUTHOR> Any recommendations?

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> 1 & 2) <http://www.printingchoice.com/battle-of-the-business-cards/>

3) Ideally, the name should describe what you do (or at least symbolize it), or be incredibly memorable.

It takes a while to come up with a good name. Spend the time necessary to pick the right one.

</comment><comment><USER4> I love these "Help me name my business" kind of questions on HN. It allows me to go a little crazy with my creativity. Anyway, here are my ideas.

First, the serious ones (stupid ones to follow)

Parts Smart

Parts Mart

Car Gutz

Purr-fect Auto Parts

The Autocrat (or The Auto-Crat)

The Auto-Dialler

The Auto Loader

Now, as promised, the ridiculous ones (the ol' reverse-psychology trick of telling your customers you're serious by giving yourself an un-serious name)

Mister Smarty-Parts

Major Partz

Underhoods

Captain Sparky

The Great Crate

Heap o' Fixin's

Drivin' Monkey, The Car Parts Junkie

I Heart Parts

Mister Friendly's Autocracy

Sloppy Jalopies

<comment><AUTHOR> I actually like some of these. However, these seem to be directed at a retail crowd.

I am distributing to mechanics. I'm not sure if they'll enjoy Autocrat automotive supplies, despite the fact that I love that one. It's actually very smart.</comment></comment>


Tell HN: SGI Indigo R3000 for free - <AUTHOR> Hi all,
I have three SGIs in my basement and my wife wants to throw them out by next clearance.
If anybody needs one, please let me know.
They are available at my door (Budapest, Hungary), no shipping, no warranty.
(I might have some install cd, documentation, keyboard and mouse as well, even a SCSI CD drive) <comment><USER2> Photos? Perhaps you can try to write a small blog post with some history and some photos, and end it with "If anybody needs one, please let me know. They are available at my door (Budapest, Hungary), no shipping, no warranty.".</comment>


Ask HN: How to deal with not being accepted for internships? - <AUTHOR>

I'm a junior in high school (DC area) and I've been applying to a bunch of different summer internships. So far I've been rejected from 2/3 of the internship programs I've applied to (haven't heard back about the 3rd).<p>I thought I was qualified for them since I program a lot along with contribute to a number of different open source projects. But then I keep on getting rejected. Any advice? <comment><USER2> You are young and many companies that offer internships are most likely prioritizing acceptance to college students that are fulfilling requirements for degrees.

With that said, don't give up though and keep pressing. I grew up outside of DC and was lucky enough to land an internship while still in high school. You may want to focus on the government sector (I found one working for a contractor at Goddard Space Flight Center doing network cabling. Learned a lot about infrastructure and also got to see some really cool stuff).

You may also want to check out the Washington Post job section. Do a search for volunteer or non-profit. Although many offer non-paying or low-paying positions, there are some good ones in there. A lot of non-profits look for people to help with their websites, intranets, or other IT related projects. The bigger non-profits sometimes have budgets that you can get a stipend from, but it is the experience you really want.

Good luck, you have plenty of years ahead of you so don't get overly bummed out if you can't find something for this summer. Just keep doing what you are doing.

<comment><USER3> thanks for the advice! the internship program at Goddard is the one I'm waiting to hear back about. one of the ones that turned me down was the SEAP program . the fact that I was turned down for that is what worries me since it makes me question my qualifications since other high schoolers got in.

<comment><AUTHOR> Well there some competition is! How many have you applied for?

<comment><USER3> 4 different internships and all said no except goddard which is replying soon i think.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> Honestly, keep applying.

Being rejected 2/3 of the time for a first step is actually quite good! I have one friend who was turned down 42 times in a row and still landed a sweet job. He even uses that as part of his story for Meetup presentations about never giving up.

Keep applying!

<comment><USER3> Yup, that is what I've also been doing.

</comment></comment><comment><USER5> It's important to not take it too personally. There may be many reasons why you were not accepted.

Either way, keep working hard, keep programming and stay humble and positive. Eventually, you'll land something.

Rejection is only a door to a different opportunity.

<comment><AUTHOR> Any advice on how to improve my application (for the future)? Up until now I've been making sure to be active on Github and contribute to open source projects thinking that it would be impressive. But maybe not?

<comment><USER5> Without knowing what went on in the interviews you've had, I would say to reflect on them and see what you feel went wrong. Was it technical? Was it communication? Was it how you presented yourself?

Contributing to open-source projects is a great way to get noticed. But there's more to interviewing than just the technical part. Companies also need to make sure that you would fit the culture and your work will help them further advance. If you can find, communicate and convince them that you can help them advance their mission, I am certain they will give you a look

All in all, continue to pursue and don't be afraid to show your passion and enthusiasm.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER3> Yeah, I'm in the same position as you except I'm in pretty much the same position (in maryland). so far i've gotten a no from everyone. too many smart kids in this area....

<comment><AUTHOR> PM me your email, let's chat sometime.

<comment><USER3> I don't think hacker news has a PM function, just shoot me an email: email@example.com

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER2> Not sure if you have checked this out or not:

[http://www.1776.vc/summer-2015-internships/](http://www.1776.vc/summer-2015-internships/)</comment>


US bans all Samsung Galaxy Note 7s from flights - <AUTHOR> https://www.cnet.com/au/news/samsung-galaxy-note-7-banned-flights-planes-faa-airlines/ <comment><USER2> Can't you take the battery out or does newer Samsung phones have them builtin like Apple? If you can, it seems like that should of been an allowed option since it can't catch on fire unless in use from my understanding.

I wonder what happens if your on vacation or a business trip, and can't take your phone back home with you. Can you just go to any store and get a refund?

"The phones also cannot be shipped as air cargo." I wonder how the returned phones will get back to Samsung, I figured the stores would probably have to ship them back to their HQ or wherever</comment>


Swift Standard Library: Generators, Sequences and Collections - <AUTHOR> http://iosdeveloperzone.com/2014/10/13/swift-standard-library-generators-sequences-and-collections/

<comment><USER2> If you're learning Swift, I'm building a database of Swift resources to make the process easier.

[http://www.h4labs.com/dev/ios/swift.html](http://www.h4labs.com/dev/ios/swift.html)

And I just posted it to HN here:

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8815739](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8815739)

<comment><USER3> Could you perhaps add this to Github so others can make contributions to the database?

<comment><USER2> I probably should create an input screen, etc. I'm not familiar with AppEngine's datastore though. Anyway, I put the tsv on github.

[https://github.com/melling/SwiftResource](https://github.com/melling/SwiftResource)

The data is here:

[https://github.com/melling/SwiftResource/blob/master/swift_u...](https://github.com/melling/SwiftResource/blob/master/swift_urls.tsv)

For this to work, I probably need scripts to prevent duplicates, etc.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> _" So a generator is simply something that can give you the next element of some sequence of elements."_

Is this a common usage of the word "generator"?

At least in JavaScript and Python you'd call that an "iterator", and a "generator" is a special type of function that acts as an iterator, using the "yield" keyword.

<comment><USER5> A _generator_ is an iterator created and returned by a _generator function_.

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> the Sequence / Generator pattern in swift is analogous to IEnumerable, IEnumerator in .net, though I've found it's harder to implement.

<comment><USER7> Yes indeed. Swift lacks the "yield return" statement of C#. Yet you can do well with "SequenceOf" and "GeneratorOf".

// Fibonacci sequence

let fib = SequenceOf { () -> GeneratorOf<Int> in

        var a = 0, b = 1

        return GeneratorOf {
            () -> Int? in
            let c = a + b
            a = b
            b = c
            return a
        }

}

// Print Fibonacci numbers <= 1000

for e in fib {

        if e > 1000 {
            break
        }

        print(" \(e)")

}

println()

$ xcrun swift fib_test.swift

1 1 2 3 5 8 13 21 34 55 89 144 233 377 610 987

See [http://www.oki-osk.jp/esc/swift/linq.html](http://www.oki- osk.jp/esc/swift/linq.html)</comment></comment>


Blizzard's Diablo III On Linux? - <AUTHOR> http://www.phoronix.com/scan.php?page=news_item&px=MTA5Njk

<comment><USER2> Well that headline disappointed me. A lot. :-(</comment>


Analyse Asia 55: From Alphabet to Uber and 1 Year on with Sameer Singh - <AUTHOR> http://analyse.asia/2015/08/26/episode-55-from-alphabet-to-uber-and-1-year-on-with-sameer-singh/ <comment><AUTHOR> Episode Synopsis: Sameer Singh, our first guest on the podcast, joined us to discuss all things business and technology from Alphabet to Uber. We began instead with an interview our host of the show, Bernard on his reflections on the first year of Analyse Asia to the future plans of the podcast including the upcoming launch of a new podcast entitled 15 Minutes. Then we dived deep into our usual major topics: (a) the implications of Alphabet to Google and its impact in Asia, (b) the Apple Watch sales and what will be happening on the upcoming Apple event rumored on 9 Sep, (c) the eventual fate of Samsung and (d) analysing Uber's financials and scrutinising whether it's really growing with a justified valuation.</comment>


Ditaa: DIagrams Through Ascii Art - <AUTHOR> http://ditaa.sourceforge.net/ <comment><USER2> Well, OK, but usually I want to go the other way. How about something that can take a drawing produced in some sort of reasonable drawing tool and produce ASCII art that I can include in some kind of ASCII-only file (like program source.) Originating a drawing in ASCII-art is about as fun as a poke in the eye with a sharp stick.

Certainly, there is value on ASCII-art to nice-graphics mark-up, but only to the extent that the ASCII-art is used as an intermediate, human readable, common-demoninator storage format. Authoring in ASCII-art just needs to stop.

</comment><comment><USER3> Migrated to github:

[https://github.com/stathissideris/ditaa](https://github.com/stathissideris/ditaa)

(SF.net lists 2011 as SVN trunk date, github lists "13 days ago")

In related work, see also my Go port at:

[https://github.com/akavel/ditaa](https://github.com/akavel/ditaa)

(side by side comparison: [http://akavel.github.io/ditaa/](http://akavel.github.io/ditaa/))

</comment><comment><USER4> Aw. I wrote a UNIX filter to do that around 1980. It looked at lines of text three lines at a time, and converted "+", "-", "_", and "|" characters used together to line drawing characters to make clean boxes, lines, and joins.

        ┏━━━━━━━━━━┓       ┏━━━━━━━━━━┓
        ┃Like this.┣━━━━━━━┫          ┃
        ┗━━━━┳━━━━━┛       ┗━━━━━━━━━━┛
             ┃
             ┃             ┏━━━━━━━━━━┓
             ┗━━━━━━━━━━━━━┫          ┃
                           ┗━━━━━━━━━━┛

<comment><AUTHOR> It's perfect!

How did you do that?

<comment><USER4> Unicode line drawing characters in a Markdown monospace code block.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> Markdeep from Morgan McGuire can do something like this too: [https://casual- effects.com/markdeep/](https://casual-effects.com/markdeep/)

</comment><comment><USER6> From their examples:

        +</comment><comment>--+   +</comment><comment>-+    +</comment><comment>-+
        |        | --+ ditaa +--> |       |
        |  Text  |   +</comment><comment>-+    |diagram|
        |Document|   |!magic!|    |       |
        |     {d}|   |       |    |       |
        +---+----+   +</comment><comment>-+    +</comment><comment>-+
            :                         ^
            |       Lots of work      |
            +</comment><comment></comment><comment></comment><comment></comment><comment>-+

Typing this out is a lot more work than creating it in Visio...

<comment><USER7> Agreed. But check out artist mode on Emacs...

<comment><USER6> ok.. maybe this is only a value add for Emacs users?

<comment><USER8> org-mode certainly supports it, which is a big plus.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> Related: [http://monodraw.helftone.com](http://monodraw.helftone.com) is a beautiful ASCII Diagramming Tool for Mac.

</comment><comment><USER10> There used to be ditaa.org which provided access to ditaa via a simple HTTP API. Unfortunately it seems to have vanished.

<comment><USER11> My fault. It was running on a free Amazon ec2 instance and I forgot to transition it to paid when the time ran out. If anyone wants to get it running again I've still got the domain and can point it to the right place.

I'm on vacation now but this gives me a good reason to get it working again!

<comment><AUTHOR> An idea (don't know if it's feasible) is to compile to JS with GWT and put that to GitHub pages.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> > a small command-line utility written in Java

That somehow sounds wrong. Other than that, very cute. I remember when i wrote a task tracker for myself in school projects and suddenly there was a requirement to print them out. Creating a ASCII representation was the most fun part.

</comment><comment><USER13> Better up your varnish game

</comment><comment><USER14> not to be confused with DITA: The Darwin Information Typing Architecture[1].

[1]. [http://dita.xml.org/](http://dita.xml.org/)</comment>


The case for raising chickens in virtual reality - <AUTHOR> https://www.vox.com/2014/5/19/5729182/the-case-for-raising-chickens-in-virtual-reality <comment><AUTHOR> This is The Matrix. For Chickens. [http://www.secondlivestock.com/](http://www.secondlivestock.com/)</comment>