Category: Innovation, economics, society at large

Book by Quote: Time Reborn

Lee Smolin’s 00:00 Time Reborn, Allen Lane 2013, ISBN 9781846142994: A curious read, as I, too, was off-put by the development of the first section in believing LS would actually agree with the “No Time’rs”, ploughing on with No! No! You can’t seriously mean that! when suddenly LS makes a u-ey and explains how things actually are. And then, unfortunately, ends with an almost delirious account on the edge of philosophy – before caving in to e.g., religion. An unfortunate afterburner where the twist to that, should’ve been straight ahead into hermeneutics.
But then again, here we have the, not really representative quotes:

Anyone who thinks that the correct theory of politics or economics was written down in the century before last is thinking outside of time. (p.XV)

We reenter time when we realize that every feature of human organization is a result of history, so that everything about them is negotiable and subject to improvement by the invention of new ways of doing things. (p.XVI)

On a personal level, to think in time is to accept the uncertainty of life as the necessary price of being alive. To rebel against the precariousness of life, to adopt a zero tolerance to risk, to imagine that life can be organized to completely eliminate danger, is to think outside time. To be human is to live suspended between danger and opportunity. (pp.XVI-XVII)

Could we overcome the capriciousness of life and achieve a state in wherein we knew, if not everything, enough to see all the consequences of our choices – the dangers and the opportunities alike? This is, could we live a truly rational life, without surprises? If time were an illusion, we could imagine this as possible … Some number, some formula, could be computed and decoded to tell us all we needed to know.
But if time is real, the future is not determinable from knowledge of the present. (p.XVII)

Relativity strongly suggests that the whole history of the world is a timeless unity; present, past, and future have no meaning apart from human subjectivity. Time is just another dimension of space, and the sense we have of experiencing moments passing is an illusion behind which is a timeless reality. These assertions may seem horrifying to anyone whose worldview includes a place for free will or human agency. (p.XXII)

Now, a pic, and Moar:
dudokhsumlinkshuge[May have used this Dudok beauty before, H’sum]
Continue reading “Book by Quote: Time Reborn”

Not on our / I watch ..?

OK, so I wrote about the lack of API integration (yes, double) in IoT land. Which seems about to change. Now that this has come around. Tools in their early adopter stage, gotta love ’em. Next, the breakthrough.
Of IoT, too; but in what direction? Countries’ hardware infrastructures first, how deep down to B2C channels? The other way around, home channels all the way up? SocMed to wearables to life tracking blends? We’ll see. Maybe soon.

But for one thing: That geriatric-thinking pseudoreligion time-teller will not connect to the rest of the world. Sad (??). Will become the next one down. Hopefully.

For your viewing pleasure:
20140905_201020[Heaps upon Sea, indeed]

Security accountability: We’re off

Remember the Vasco i.e. Diginotar certificate breach scandal ..? For the many that don’t read Dutch easily enough, the gist of this court decision is that the previous owners of Diginotar are accountable for the damages to Vasco following the breach since the previous Diginotar owners hadn’t secured their systems well enough.

There’s a lot to be said here.

  • E.g., that the security lapses could have been known. Due diligence …? Well, the PwC reports were all green traffic lights, at the procedures-on-paper level. But a couple of years before the take-over, already a third party (ITSec, which I know for their good work [disclaimer: have no business relations]) had notified Diginotar about shop-floor level deficiencies. That remained uncorrected.
     
  • Add to that, that actually, the previous owners themselves started legal claims. Because a major part of their sale proceeds were still held in escrow, and they wanted the monay. Vasco filed a counter claim; logically, and won.
     
  • Also, the auditors that had time and time again ‘assured’ the security of the scheme (and don’t get me started about limiting the scope of such assurance in scope vagueness or in the fine print!), haven’t felt too much backfire. Yet, hopefully. Though recently, the same firm announced an initiative towards a new, proprietary one can guess, security standard. Right.

So, are we finally seeing accountability breaking through ..? I already posted something on the Target Cxx stepdown for similar security lapse(s). Now this one. The trickle’s there, let the deluge follow. That‘ll teach ’em! And of course, generate a humongous market for backlog bug remediation, from the software levels up through controls to governance levels…
Even if that would stifle innovation for a while. Would that be a bad thing; having only the real improvements breaking through and not the junk ones ..?

OK then, now for a picture:
DSCN0358
[Monteriggione security was effective, until not, then abandoned as control approach… they did, why not all of us today?]

Algorapp

Just a short shout-out to this awesome initiative: logo-sm Algorithmia.com, the open marketplace for algorithms; easy to include in your app(s) that will make you [ rich | famous | achieve your full potential hence Happy with a capital ]. (If you don’t know how to read that, never mind.)

Look now, Open (?) Source Crowdsharing gets another bump. Again a need to improve education… to be able to fully realize all the huge potential.

OK, to close off of course:
??????????
[How did they calculate the construction before calculus was developed ..? Yes Siena]

Old mass education

Everyone under 18, and anyone 18 and older, needs a massive re-schooling in all things new.
Yes that includes the savants that can hack (99,9% of which is just script kiddies, more on that below), and it includes those that may be slow learners due to age.

But first, a picture:
DSCN9832[Pfanner, Lucca]

The subjects to mass re-school for:

  • Programming of all sorts. Not just CSS/HTML. Also, perl/PHP, SQL, C, Prolog, etc. Etc. Etc. From fundamentals (yes indeed) all the way to slick quasi-savvy app programming. To know what’s under the hood, to be able to work in the field, at all ages to one’s level.
    Oh, and let’s not forget all would need to know how to configure a network, and how to secure it.
  • Design, that is such an important part of Making things these days.
  • IoT and 3D printing (see the previous ones coming together?), for the future; to be able to navigate and play an active role. Otherwise, masses get isolated and out of anything resembling jobs. If you can’t operate in tomorrow’s society, if you can’t do anything worth a living wage, you’ll be cast out.
  • Ethics and sociology, in particular re privacy, the coming Singularity, and World problems like global warming, waste and environmental destruction, and resource depletion. Whether by Augmented Humanity or full humanity oblivion, the future comes to us too fast to first see and then adjust. All now present may NOT defer this to others. You ARE all the others like never before.
  • And all that we know already. All science, humanities, etc. Because schooling has lowered its standards so much. Having more and more (%) in ever ‘higher’ education but teaching less and less. Overall, isn’t coping with society and its complexity the sum total aggregated goal of education ..? Where society has become so much more complex than it was; exponential growth in this one, too has not been dealt with in Ed, on the contrary. Re-creating a plebs. Of all shapes and sizes, including moneyed plebs. The latter seem to rule… I’ll come back to this issue, later. Book by Quote’s pending…

Hey, it’s just a matter of survival beyond mere bare physical needs, for the very near future of all.

And, how to educate all ..?

  • Through gaming, of course
  • Through non-gaming rote learning all the essentials as well. Otherwise, you’ll fail miserably in practice when reality somehow doesn’t quite conform the game show. Which it won’t for decades to come. And no, shallow learning will not work; if only because it’s not learning at all.
  • Through gaining reality experience, of course in the course(s). As application is everything also re turning ratio learning into experience and control.
  • Through in-depth specialisations, to all sorts of levels and breaths. As almost all (except the very, very few script/kit builders) of today’s hackers are script kiddies and the ‘markets’ in that area continue to develop, some knowledge and experience may actually get lost! No, the ‘net does not ‘save’ everything; information production is just too large every day for the storage available globally…
  • All this delivered in traditional classrooms, mixed with MOOCs, mixed with interactive self-learning in class or at home or elsewhere. Which means teachers will have to be re-schooled too, if only because a too large share of them already are backward, too lowly educated (in content) laggerds. As in: VTuIPMt

What a task for society. But if ignored, the amount of ignorance will just be too big for the world to handle. Your comments, please.

Wired / Tired / Expired, September 2014 edition

Photo7c
[Not as much from another planet as from half a century ago]

Yes we’re back with this; here’s the September edition of my Wired / Tired / Expired jargon watch overviews, a mixed bag; see what you missed this Summer:

WIRED TIRED EXPIRED
Humanity Analytics Cloud
The latest wave is about humanity again, fortunately, as the first signals of a massive increase of human vs. machine intelligence and capabilities, precursors of a societal debate on the singularity or the parts of its checkered implementation (timeline) hopefully, come out into the open. Via the predicted AI integration bubbling up everywhere. All aboard the night train. It keeps on running, and so are some. But not necessarily you. It’s just that the whole thing has become too diffuse to still get a grip on. So media attention has been lost. Not totalitarian’s attention – civil rights movementers (movers?) watch out. If you think this is still hot, or even hype, you belong in the Museum of Ancient History
Note-taking in paper notebooks Note-taking on tablets Note-taking on laptops
Yes, moving beyond the sect of St. Steve …! As per the above, the Slow Living idea, as elaborated into the co-operation/-everything environments of organizational life, is spreading. For the good of mankind. Also, this, and #4 of this. A fool with a tool is still a tool. You Late Majority! And, it’s going this way. Hopefully. Hm, valid, for professional note-takers. Not for the casual meeting browsers, though.
Instant hyper-amateur ‘shops Memes GIFs (-as-Jifs),
tied with
Viral videos
0,15 seconds of fame. Expressing the idea, permanence not as much. Which is efficient and (hence?) laudable in its own way. I don’t often need to explain, but if I do … Memes may have been a full product (sic) cycle that many may have missed completely. Who has time for those? To make, to take.
Don’t care Dissing ‘mainstream’ Digging Hip
(incl Beards…)
Just be yourself. Ensure that’s enough. For you. Having become mainstream, it’s a Tu Quoque (jokes on yourself) now. Ehhh, you were backpacking for half a year in an area without WiFi or something..!?!? How could you do that, and not recover in half a day?
Deca. Or reading classical, well-bound hardcover books. PDF reading Kindle et al.
As in this.
And, the ultimate long-form, reading classics of all ages as treasured elements of Culture. The humanity and its wisdom that transpires through the centuries.		 For the operational content. Nothing else. Nice try, but on its way to the great heap of just-didn’t-make-it-to-be-great-inventions.
Deal with it Dogue What Happen
In the Why Should I Care What Your Problems Are They Won’t Go Away If Not When I Would Much annoy. Moved into this sector.
Modern tech moving into business 3D printing for gadgetry IoT promises
As in: Apple joining forces with IBM, Microsoft re-invigorating its business offerings, et al. As in this fad(s); sad. Spoils the idea instead of pushing widespread household use Sort of the same hypepromises not being delivered by far while we would still wanted to have it all happen(ed).
NASA’s UFO Amazon drone delivery Attack of the Drones
Woot! We humans are finally making it happen ourselves …!? Maybe it will happen. Maybe not. What increase in service ..? Now that it’s a fact; have we learned how to deal with it …? (I mean, in a way that would let us stay comfortable even if brought home ubiquitously?)

OK, any suggestions for next month’s edition ..?

Jargon Watch: Dorking

Google Dorking, to be more precise. Though some startup Internet company (you know, that has a ‘web site’) may want the adjective dropped.
[Maybe they’d better do a ‘); DROP TABLE STUDENTS; — on themselves but that’s another matter entirely]
Which is exepelainifyed in this doc, and at this site (from where I took the doc, duh).

Okay, since it’s Friday afternoon, I’ll leave you with:
h108B4EAA

Maverisk / Étoiles du Nord