Why would you want to print anything else? Assault rifles and handguns.

Why not print something you can use?

Why can't he use them? Does he not have any high ranking federal government officials within reasonable traveling distances? :)

Strat

That'd be like etching a pcb without testing the circuit on a breadboard first. Sure, it is what you have to do for large complex projects. But for most small projects it is painfully slow and error prone.

Etching a PCB (well, actually, letting somebody like expresspcb do it) instead of testing a circuit on a breadboard first is something I do all the time.

If you're ready to accept a breadboard, that means you're willing to accept one or two for a start, and they don't have to be pretty, which means that if they were PCBs, you wouldn't mind a few blue-wires.

If you're in that position, and your circuit has more than a few handfuls of nets on it, and your time is valuable and you have other stuff to do before your circuit comes back, and you're halfway proficient at electronics and at double-checking your work...

If all those things are true, you'll have a much nicer working PCB in much less time than it would take to get your crappy, flaky breadboard working.

As the saying goes, YMMV, but that's been my experience over decades of doing this.

(or at a more advanced level, are programming a computer to learn how to learn things)

That is pure hope as well as circular. I don't think he's dismissing the concept so much as dismissing the current field operatives as being anywhere near as far along as they promote themselves to be. He's doing it with a heavy dollop of derision, but I'm seeing that from the opposite side as well. .

Let's simply do a change up on a few words and query as to how the brain stores concepts and can compare, contrast and combine them. .

I read nothing in that article describing 'how' other than hypothetical. It was obvious from the gp that "idea how" referred to knowledge of actual functioning.

Might you then explain to us how a neuron weighs the incoming signals and decides which axons to direct its outgoing signals to?

I know you gave yourself a caveat with "large scale", but those large scales don't really cut it for understanding how the brain fundamentally works, and in order to replicate its functioning in code (develop actual artificial intelligence), we will need to understand that. Add in how the effects of the various chemical baths it is subjected to modify cellular functioning and the prospect is even muddier. (That 'testy' lashing out allusion.)

We don't simply need to know what areas do what and a vague knowledge of how they interact, we need to understand in enough detail what it is they are doing at all levels for us to translate that into a hairily complex software system . A system quite a bit more hairy than one using a movie script database would or could be.

I'd put money on the programmers having coded in a limit (possible variable) on the number of times a specific line of inquiry could be asked before that rather canned response was generated.

Don't project your distaste for shots of yourself onto others. They may not have the same hangups or fixations.

Well, it's not like black youth are inundated with the glorification of "thug life" and "gangsta" culture, or that blacks that *do* do well are often labeled by their peers as "actin' like dey white"...

I'm black and I don't know a single person that talks like that. Not among my family, friends, or acquaintances. I do encounter this stereotype quite frequently on television, music and on the internet though.

I'm not saying there aren't people who think like that. But that it's not as common way of think as rap videos and off-hand comments would lead you to believe.

E.g. How many of these people you overheard were actually being serious? And not making fun of the stereotype?

I live a short distance outside Detroit. Come take a drive with me some afternoon and I'll introduce you to countless examples. I'm a professional blues guitarist and regularly live, work, and eat with black people and have for decades, and have dated a number of black women over the years as well, many with children. It's a result of the culmination of decades of cultural and social messages blacks receive their entire lives from government entitlement programs, affirmative action laws & policies, schools/colleges, music/media/mainstream news, and their peers.

Strat

But back on topic, how is this facebook or google's problem? Facebook can't hire people that don't exist.

We've completely strayed from that topic in this sub-discussion, and are just talking about why things are the way they are.

You're absolutely right: FB, Google, etc. have little control over this stuff. To change it requires changing society in a big way, and it'll take decades for the changes to really bear fruit. These companies can't hire engineers who don't exist, and to create them would require getting to kids when they're really young and changing their environment.

-1 Stupid.

Being "racist" doesn't mean you're a white supremacist necessarily, it just means you treat people differently based on their race, and that you have certain assumptions about races.

It's a very common assumption in America today that blacks and hispanics are stupid and prone to joining gangs, and that Asians are smart and successful. So anyone operating under those assumptions is naturally going to treat black suspects poorly, and Asian suspects well. Of course, like many stereotypes, the statistics kinda back up these assumptions, but that's the problem with racism (or any generalization): just because a group of people exhibits certain behavior on average doesn't mean every individual in that group conforms to it. Some poor smart black kid in the ghetto who wants to go to college and study CS can be easily screwed over (by the cops, the schools, etc.) because he lives around a bunch of dumb thugs.

The woeful underperformance of AAs is because of historical inertia and ongoing racism that comes from it (such as people like you who make generalizations, and then everyone in that group is forever screwed because they can't overcome these generalizations). African immigrants don't have the same historical problems that AAs have; they leapfrog over those problems.

Think about it: suppose you can either be born a dumb white boy in a middle-class family, or a dumb black boy in a ghetto. Which lifetime is going to be better? As a dumb black boy, you'll probably end up joining a gang or getting involved in some other criminal pursuit because of your peers in that area, the lack of opportunities, etc. As a dumb white boy, you'll still go to a pretty decent school, get a diploma, your dad will probably help you find a decent job, etc. I knew a guy in high school who wasn't all that bright (he wasn't stupid really, but he wasn't scholastically smart, and got put into the lower-level classes for non-college-bound kids). His dad was really smart and an engineer, and set up a business for them to work on together, so when this guy graduated high school, he just continued the business (internet sales) and made really good money and bought himself a really nice upper-middle-class house; he never went to college or had to work in some shit job like someone else with his educational background. Some poor black kid would never have had an opportunity like that.

Black youth are given the same opportunities that every other youth is given. They can attend public school.

Oh please, this is a load of horse shit.

Public schools are not the same everywhere. That's exactly why they tried that whole "busing" scheme (which they're still doing in some places I believe). Schools are run at the local level, not the federal level, and are comprised of students from the local area, and teachers willing to work at that school, so schools in rich districts are good and well-funded, while schools in poor districts are full or problems and have terrible funding, and worse, good teachers don't want to work there because it's too dangerous. Yes, a lot of students in poor places aren't exactly great students and frequently engage in criminal behavior, but for those who would like to be good students, this is not a good environment for them, and it sure as hell isn't equivalent to the school environment in a rich district. A white student in an upper-middle-class district doesn't have to worry about peer pressure to join a gang or having good teachers and the academic credentials needed to pass the SAT and get into college.

Good one Microsoft! You blew up the spaceship!

Yes and no... Opposite sex or same sex marriage is the same institution, marriage, and nothing changes when you change the genders of those involved. Polygamous marriage is a different institution, as you admit when you said "the question of marital property [in polygamy] is one of the issues that legislatures will have to address when the ban is overturned as it inevitably will be".

As a different institution, the fact that marriage is a fundamental right is irrelevant to whether polygamy is a fundamental right, any more than a right to marry being fundamental means that driving a car is a fundamental right.

That is a fine and workable solution but it can't be done by simply changing the word "wife" or "husband" to "spouse". It would require a new statute that is similar to the above (or likewise based on the Uniform Partnership Act, which covers your other situation). That's different from simply enabling gay marriage..

Well, it's not like black youth are inundated with the glorification of "thug life" and "gangsta" culture, or that blacks that *do* do well are often labeled by their peers as "actin' like dey white", "uncle Toms", "house niggas" (all things I've heard blacks say personally, as well), and any that profess anti-entitlement-society, pro-family views are excoriated by both their peers and "news" media.

I frankly greatly admire minorities in the US that have the courage and determination to run that gauntlet instead of cave to the pressure to "stay on the plantation" and instead go on to use their intelligence, talents, skills, and strong work ethic to do well and become an asset to their communities and to society.

Strat