2.12.08

Pyrkimys panna toimeksi

The Public Domain: Enclosing the Commons of the Mind - Internetin ekosysteemiä on suojeltava tekijänoikeusmafialta kuin viidakon ekosysteemiä saastuttavilta yhtiöiltä.
The environmental movement gained much of its persuasive power by pointing out that for structural reasons we were likely to make bad environmental decisions: a legal system based on a particular notion of what “private property” entailed and an engineering or scientific system that treated the world as a simple, linearly related set of causes and effects. In both of these conceptual systems, the environment actually disappeared; there was no place for it in the analysis. Small surprise, then, that we did not preserve it very well. I have argued that the same is true about the public domain. The confusions against which the Jefferson Warning cautions, the source-blindness of a model of property rights centered on an “original author,” and the political blindness to the importance of the public domain as a whole (not “my lake,” but “the Environment”), all come together to make the public domain disappear, first in concept and then, increasingly, as a reality. To end this process we need a cultural environmentalism, an environmentalism of the mind, and over the last ten years we have actually begun to build one.

Procrastinating Again? How to Kick the Habit
- Ole aina yhden askeleen päässä maalista, Get Things Done.
Working with Richmond, molecular geneticist Edward Ginns used a molecular decoy called DNA antisense to partially shut down production of a receptor for dopamine in a region of the monkeys’ brains called the rhinal cortex that associates visual cues with reward. The treatment diminished dopamine’s effects to the point that the monkeys could no longer predict when any given trial would earn them a juice treat. Thus, they hedged their bets, working hard all the time as if “they are always one trial away from the penultimate,” Richmond says. -- “Habits become nonconscious brain processes,” Pychyl says. “When procrastination becomes chronic, a person is, essentially, running on autopilot.” Some experts suggest replacing the reflex to postpone with time-stamped prescriptions for action. Psychologist Peter Gollwitzer of New York University and the University of Konstanz in Germany advises creating “implementation intentions,” which specify where and when you will perform a specific behavior. So rather than setting a vague goal such as “I will get healthy,” set one with its implementation, including timing, built in—say, “I will go to the health club at 7:30 a.m. tomorrow.”

A Soldier, Taking Orders From Its Ethical Judgment Center
- Seuraava yhdistelmä herätti hilpeyttä monella tasolla.
“My research hypothesis is that intelligent robots can behave more ethically in the battlefield than humans currently can,” said Ronald C. Arkin -- -- Dr. Arkin, a Christian who acknowledged the help of God and Jesus Christ in the preface to his book --
Terminaattori voisi kyllä helposti olla eettisempi valinta taistelukentälle kuin kiihkouskovainen itsemurhapommittaja, mutta ovatko taistelukenttien tapauskovaiset tarpeeksi robotteja omasta takaa? Vai tarvitsemmeko paremmin "Älä tapa" -käskyä suorittavia taistelurobotteja? Tarvitsevatko sotarobotit oman sotilaspapin? Mitä jos nämä terminaattorit menevät sekaisin, lopettavat sotimisen ja kääntyvät ateisteiksi? Jonkinlainen itsetuhojärjestelmä sellaisen skenaarion varalle olisi varmaan rakennettava... mistä muistuikin mieleeni tämä video.

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