That makes a ratio of 216,000,000 : 1, on a processor to human brain ratio. That isn't really fair, since a modern processor will use much less energy than the human brain but lets roll with it anyway. That seems insurmountable, but only because it's difficult to appreciate just how much faster and more powerful processors are today than they were even half a decade ago.

That ratio puts us about 11 "doubling" periods away from being able to use a 90,000 cpu cluster to simulate a mind in real time. Historically, the doubling period has been 18-24 months, so that puts it about 20 years away from large scale institutions being able to simulate a facsimile of a human mind. 17 doublings (~30 years) after that, a single processor would have the ability to simulate a human brain.

Now, there's a lot to be argued about there. There's absolutely no guarantee that processor improvement will continue at historical levels (and lots of obvious and less obvious arguments against it). But then again, chip designers have approached "impossible" barriers to improvement many times in the past and have simply changed tacks to go around them. There's no guarantee that the current simulations are at all accurate, perhaps chemical or even quantum processes significantly drive human thought for instance. But then again, 50 years is a long time to perfect the simulations.

So... Hawking is a Skroderider?

Not sure why it's funny, Hawking might be a brilliant theoretical physicist but that doesn't make him a brilliant artificial intelligence researcher any more than my competence at creating code makes me a classical painter.

The amount of development that has occurred in Africa over the last 50 years is staggering. Ignoring it to make a point is dishonest and smacks of prejudice at the very least.

Oh god I hate weighing in on the wrong side of this argument but I can't let this one lie. (For the record, I'm assuming based on what you are responding to that you're being sarcastic, if you're not... well, so it goes). Yes, natural selection can work in about 100 years. Natural selection can work in about 100s if the environment changed the right way. Do note, natural selection is only a single part of evolution, and for lasting, long term changes to occur requires, among other things, mutations. Those kinds of changes take dozens of generations. Simply changing the rate of expression of a gene in the gene pool is as simple as removing the genes you don't like, which can happen very, very rapidly.

In some states you can request the evidence. In WI for instance you can ask to see the radar gun (with read speed still displayed) as well as the certification information for said gun. Generally this is a bad idea, since it will take you from "maybe get out of this with a warning" into "they will throw everything they can at you even if they can't get you for speeding".

In theory yes, in practice it's unlikely to ever come up. Wear leveling does wonders, over provisioning does more on top.

If SSDs had come first you'd be saying the same thing about HDDs: Don't HDDs have fragile mechanical parts that fail randomly?

There's 3 types of people:

1) People who lose tools by accident
2) People who steal tools on purpose
3) People who don't lose or steal tools

You might prevent or reduce losses from category 1. You will create a minor inconvenience for people in category 2. And you will piss off everyone in category 3 who will feel like they're no longer trusted.

You can't just ramp up and down a nuclear power plant when the sun goes behind a cloud (exaggeration for affect). It takes a long time for a reactor to heat up and an even longer time for it to cool down. They are very poor when it comes to the use you are advocating.

Alternatively, what they're saying is that it's going to be really really hard and we should take every opportunity possible. Just because small changes aren't enough by themselves doesn't mean small changes don't have a positive impact.

Central to what they are saying is that it isn't enough to be cheaper than coal, you have to be so much cheaper than coal that power companies shutter their coal plants ahead of schedule. We are still building coal plants today, not all that many of them but a few. They will be in operation for 40-50 years according to the plans laid down when they were built.

Anything that touches your skin is disposed of or sterilized. The total service would include 2 minutes to your place, 15 minutes to get you loaded up (I've seen this take up to an hour when my neighbor was unconscious for unclear reasons), 2 minutes back, half hour of wiping down every surface you touched or might have touched, half hour of taking stock of what was used and restocking it, and a half hour of documenting all of that for the insurance costs. I don't think 2 hours is an unrealistic estimate.

And like I said, most days those guys are probably sitting around, getting 1 or two calls per day. Your bill covers that waiting around time also. If it didn't, they wouldn't be waiting around. And if they weren't waiting around, you wouldn't get treatment for half an hour or more when you need it.

Today:
"There's no reason for such firms to be willing to cooperate with state agencies over child abuse but not over combating terrorism"

Tomorrow:
"There's no reason for such firms to be willing to cooperate with state agencies over terrorism but not over combating organized crime"

[etc]

Soon enough:
"There's no reason for such firms to be willing to cooperate with state agencies over petty theft but not over combating traffic violations"

$485 actually... just doesn't seem that bonkers to me, sorry. Two medical professionals, probably 2 hours when all is said and done. Any equipment they used on you must be either disposed of and replaced or sterilized. And you're not just paying for those 2 hours, you're paying for them to be sitting around waiting for you to need them. Now arguably that's an externality that perhaps shouldn't be shoveled onto each individual's bill, but changing that would require a very significant overhaul of the system.

What need of a comet? Species are already dying off at rates not seen in hundreds of millions of years.