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POPSBrains are learning addicts The stimulus in the brain when learning something new is very similar to opiates on sight of the receptors involved. Interestingly, the stronger stimuli are produced by novel, unexpected and understandable information, which matches the artificial curiosity theory.
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POPSJürgen Schmidhuber: Artificial Curiosity and Creativity Very interesting talk about artificial curiosity, the algorithmic principles that define it and how could it be implemented. Curiosity is also related with art, in the way that the satisfaction derived from enjoying art is very similar (if not equal) to satisfying our curiosity, which opens the way to artificial art creation.
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POPSAutonomy is a better motivator than money Apparently researchers found that autonomy and freedom are better motivators for cognitive tasks than money, even if the cognitive load is small. It's linked with the open source development in the video and the blog I found this*, but I think it is also related with X and Y theories and can be applied to most of the businesses in our society, which is more and more knowledge oriented. I could not clip the video from there and I gave up trying.
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POPSHADD: That little conspiracy theorist inside each of us We are hardwired to be paranoids, to some extent. That may help us to find the true explanation behind things, or to delude ourselves with unrealistic explanations. “Just because you're paranoid doesn't mean they aren't after you” - Kurt Cobain
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POPSDesign patterns: a must for large software projects This is amplified from an interview with GoF. For sure design patterns are required to build large software projects, but the most encouraging point to me is that now small programs can perform tasks that would require huge programs previously. To a big extent that is because of the capabilities of previous libraries, frameworks and the languages themselves. IMHO some principles, patterns, methodology or even a theory should be created about how programming languages should be made (it doesn't exist yet AFAIK), then the most complex problems could be solved with very small programs. Wouldn't that be great?
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POPSDo you want to be rich? Think twice Probably this can be generalized to other aspects of life. Everything that is done by some person is done for a reason, the source of this motivation may be in the same person, in the activity (an end in itself) or may be external to both. It is important to select carefully the ends that we will pursue and not to lose the scope they define. It is easier to get what you want when you know what is it.
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POPSUse bots for spam, to avoid it, I mean A new technique to detect spam consists on using a bot generating that spam to reverse engineer the template of the messages that it is sending. It is debatable how useful that may be, considering the time that may take and the little time needed to send vast amounts of spam. What would happen if this technique was used upon spam reception, knowing there may be several botnets and therefore several templates?
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POPSViruses hive intelligence (biology) Even very simple creatures like viruses may display intelligence, not only in their mutations, but in their behavior. It's a good example to have in mind when considering the question of what is in fact intelligence. The finding has plausible applications for vaccines too.
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POPSSurrogate robotic arms for monkeys This may be old but it isn't any less exciting for that. Monkeys are able to use robotic limbs, they are able to tell the difference from their limbs, the precision at which they operate those limbs is high enough to be useful and it is expected to be increased. This means that humans that have lost a limb could use robotic prostheses, while humans that keep all their limbs could potentially use supernumerary limbs. SciFi may not be completely out of reach.
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POPSHumans use the technology, not viceversa It is very easy to blame the technology on the worst problems of humanity. But technology is only a catalyst, which accelerates and empowers human activity. New weapons enable more lethal wars, new equipments allow saving more lives in hospitals. If new technologies seem to generate new problems it is because of this effect, which transforms something, rendering it at a greater scale and thus noticeable. For those who think otherwise, they have at their disposal may alternatives, as the Amish lifestyle.
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POPSErrare humanum est (I) "El hombre es el único animal que tropieza dos veces con la misma piedra." or "The human is the only animal that trips twice over the same stone." Since some stones seem to be part of the human nature it may be the case that tripping over them is the norm, on innumerable occasions, even if you know about the stone, check Hofstadter's law, for instance.
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POPSThe end of the computer age? I don't think so. And some people seem to expect more from the web, not to say from computers. However, it may be the case that the changes that are to come are greater and harder than those that have been seen so far. So I will just leave this here and let you draw the conclusions.
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POPSA Terminator army to save humanity from Terminator
There is a reasonable doubt about the safety of developing an artificial intelligence (AI) clever than human. On one hand whatever is the goal of it every wish may be corrupted and the consequences of this may be really bad, even if it is doing what it was originally designed to do in an optimal way. On the other hand, if the AI is clever than human it is already depicted as a close to invincible adversary, no matter what humanity thinks to defeat it, it has a better plan to defeat humanity. There are many examples of AI systems that get out of control and become enemies of their creators in SciFi, I can think about SkyNet, HAL, and VIKI now. This is nothing new, Golems had only two possible endings, destruction or insubordination if they "lived" enough. So what's the solution? The solution to prevent one of these beings from obliterating the human race is the creation of a whole army of them. Not very intuitive, potentially hilarious, but that could actually work. As explained
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POPSAre you clever? Are your rational? The human being is supposed to be an animal capable of rational thinking, however this kind of thinking seems more rare than a priori expected. That's why people with high IQs may act foolishly. IQ tests may measure the brain capacity of thought, but not the use of it people do. The key is not how much can you think, but how rational are your thoughts, how much are you getting from your brain. This is highly related with fallacies and so many things that I'm not going to enumerate them all but let you draw your own conclusions. I can foresee I will be referring to this article for years in debates.
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POPSAvatar There is a strong identification with avatars used in games, which is for sure enhanced with avatar customizability. There isn't much to say, so I'll throw a question: Which is the meaning of life and how real do you need it to be to make sense?
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POPSMemento Memory is often thought to be formed by modifications in neural connections in our brain. However, evidence suggests that there are three types of memory: long term memory, short term memory and working memory. It is hard that structural changes may occur for the formation of short term memory and it is completely impossible for working memory. Speculation: working memory is probably due to neural excitation, and if I recall correctly the number of items that memory may contain is the 'magical' 7 2.
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POPSIllusion of time Our brain crates the perception of time from a succession of neuron firings, with a frequency that depends on the group of neurons considered. However, in stressful situations, more neurons fire and time seems to slow down. Now the purpose is to get the most attention from our brains, more neuron firings and a slower time perception, without burning our brains out.
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POPSFacts are in fact irrelevant It is often more important how is something said than what is actually said. Probably that's the way the human mind works, the memes that are propagated are not the most factual, but the most appealing, intriguing, amusing or surprising. The problem are the consequences for science if the focus is set on communication at any expense instead of accuracy. However, a perfect accuracy with no communication is pointless. Thus, as with all conflicting goals, the way to go is probably a compromise, as it doesn't look like we are changing human nature anytime soon.
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POPSAre you happy with your IQ? Prepare for the speculation, which is something that I sometimes do, sorry, you have the sources linked so you can draw your own conclusions. High levels of dopamine seem to be associated with contentment, so anxiety is probably related with low levels of dopamine, with is related with high IQ and memory. Once again intelligence and happiness seem to be contrary. The second part is more tricky. It is stated that self-confidence in intelligence may be unrelated with real IQ but is related with grades. What is the cause and the consequence between the high grades and self-confidence? May that mean that IQ tests are in fact not measuring intelligence? It is in fact tricky, but now take the first part again. Self-confidence seems related with high levels of dopamine, which is related with not-so-good IQ, but good grades. So if you are happy with your IQ chances are that it is not so high. Well, that made sense. However the brain is a complex system, a small change may have
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POPSRobocop will care about your normality With so much focus on outlier detection, so much information in the Web and the deeper analysis of this information that more powerful computers and algorithms enable, why not using it for spying citizens finding freaks criminals The more capabilities computers have the better, but ethics will be a task exclusively human for a while.
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