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Comment Scientific research is moving ahead very fast. (Score 1) 4

Scientific research is rapidly improving our lives and our understanding.

AI, "Artificial Intelligence", is rapidly advancing in the normal way. Many mistakes are found in the initial methods.

We have, in many areas of Physics, a limited understanding of the world around us. This research is one example of improvement.

Submission + - The empty search for dark matter (phys.org) 1

Submitted by alternative_right
alternative_right writes: We have run dozens of direct detection experiments around the globe hunting for WIMPS—dark matter particles in this particular mass range. And they're not all the same kind of experiments. There are also the scintillators, which use a giant vat of liquefied noble gas, like several tons of xenon. They wait for a dark matter particle to strike the xenon and cause it to scintillate, which is a fancy science word for "sparkle." We see the sparkle; we detect dark matter.

WIMPs aren't alone. They're just one example of a broader class of dark matter candidates, with delightful names like Q-balls, WIMPzillas, and sterile neutrinos. We've tuned our different experiments to capture different mass ranges or interaction strengths to cover as much of that wide dark matter spectrum as possible. We've even tried to manufacture various kinds of dark matter in our particle collider experiments.

And we've found nothing.

Submission + - Falling panel prices lead to global solar boom, except for the US (arstechnica.com)

Submitted by AmiMoJo
AmiMoJo writes: Solar power developers want to cover an area larger than Washington, DC, with silicon panels and batteries, converting sunlight into electricity that will power air conditioners in sweltering Las Vegas along with millions of other homes and businesses.

But earlier this month, bureaucrats in charge of federal lands scrapped collective approval for the Esmeralda 7 projects, in what campaigners fear is part of an attack on renewable energy under President Donald Trump. “We will not approve wind or farmer destroying [sic] Solar,” he posted on his Truth Social platform in August. Developers will need to reapply individually, slowing progress.

Thousands of miles away on the other side of the Pacific Ocean, it is a different story. China has laid solar panels across an area the size of Chicago high up on the Tibetan Plateau, where the thin air helps more sunlight get through.

The Talatan Solar Park is part of China’s push to double its solar and wind generation capacity over the coming decade. “Green and low-carbon transition is the trend of our time,” President Xi Jinping told delegates at a UN summit in New York last month.

China’s vast production of solar panels and batteries has also pushed down the prices of renewables hardware for everyone else, meaning it has “become very difficult to make any other choice in some places,” according to Heymi Bahar, senior analyst at the International Energy Agency.

Comment Re:Why all this god stuff (Score 1) 226

by ChrisMaple (#65763300) Attached to: Ex-Intel CEO's Mission To Build a Christian AI

America was founded mostly by religious fanatics escaping countries that were either less fanatical or that pushed different fanatical beliefs. The result was a higher per capita fanaticism than Europe during that time period. From a higher starting point it takes longer to get to any particular lower point.

There are probably other reasons, perhaps in the US there's less punishment for believing silly things.

Comment Re:Look at the evidence! (Score 1) 226

by ChrisMaple (#65763284) Attached to: Ex-Intel CEO's Mission To Build a Christian AI

There is no evidence for resurrection, all that exists now are writings (which are not evidence) and proven frauds like the Shroud of Turin.

Richard Carrier has published what is currently the best summary and evaluation of Christian claims. In short, the odds of Biblical Jesus ever existing are at best 1 in 3.4; the chance of resurrection being true is 0. (approximations based on my watching Carrier's youtube videos)

Comment Re:They made a tweak on MAGA request (Score 2) 226

by ChrisMaple (#65763266) Attached to: Ex-Intel CEO's Mission To Build a Christian AI

Ignoring the religious aspect, America has twice the per GDP generosity of the 2nd most generous country, New Zealand.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...

Another reference puts the US at number 6, behind a very peculiar list of countries.
https://worldpopulationreview....

It's a lot easier to be charitable when you're rich, and the US is rich.

Submission + - Israel Demanded Google and Amazon Use Secret 'Wink' To Sidestep Legal Orders (theguardian.com) 1

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: When Google and Amazon negotiated a major $1.2bn cloud-computing deal in 2021, their customer – the Israeli government – had an unusual demand: agree to use a secret code as part of an arrangement that would become known as the “winking mechanism." The demand, which would require Google and Amazon to effectively sidestep legal obligations in countries around the world, was born out of Israel’s concerns that data it moves into the global corporations’ cloud platforms could end up in the hands of foreign law enforcement authorities.

Like other big tech companies, Google and Amazon’s cloud businesses routinely comply with requests from police, prosecutors and security services to hand over customer data to assist investigations. This process is often cloaked in secrecy. The companies are frequently gagged from alerting the affected customer their information has been turned over. This is either because the law enforcement agency has the power to demand this or a court has ordered them to stay silent. For Israel, losing control of its data to authorities overseas was a significant concern. So to deal with the threat, officials created a secret warning system: the companies must send signals hidden in payments to the Israeli government, tipping it off when it has disclosed Israeli data to foreign courts or investigators.

To clinch the lucrative contract, Google and Amazon agreed to the so-called winking mechanism, according to leaked documents seen by the Guardian, as part of a joint investigation with Israeli-Palestinian publication +972 Magazine and Hebrew-language outlet Local Call. Based on the documents and descriptions of the contract by Israeli officials, the investigation reveals how the companies bowed to a series of stringent and unorthodox “controls” contained within the 2021 deal, known as Project Nimbus. Both Google and Amazon’s cloud businesses have denied evading any legal obligations.

Submission + - Mathematical proof debunks the idea that the universe is a computer simulation (phys.org)

Submitted by alternative_right
alternative_right writes: Today's cutting-edge theory—quantum gravity—suggests that even space and time aren't fundamental. They emerge from something deeper: pure information.

This information exists in what physicists call a Platonic realm—a mathematical foundation more real than the physical universe we experience. It's from this realm that space and time themselves emerge.

"The fundamental laws of physics cannot be contained within space and time, because they generate them. It has long been hoped, however, that a truly fundamental theory of everything could eventually describe all physical phenomena through computations grounded in these laws. Yet we have demonstrated that this is not possible. A complete and consistent description of reality requires something deeper—a form of understanding known as non-algorithmic understanding."

Submission + - How a chorus of synchronized frequencies helps you digest your food (phys.org)

Submitted by alternative_right
alternative_right writes: It is known in the scientific community that if you have a self-sustained oscillation, such as an arteriole, and you add an external stimulus at a similar but not identical frequency, you can lock the two, meaning you can shift the frequency of the oscillator to that of the external stimulus. In fact, it has been shown that if you connect two clocks, they will eventually synchronize their ticking.

Distinguished Professor of Physics and Neurobiology David Kleinfeld found that if he applied an external stimulus to a neuron, the entire vasculature would lock at the same frequency. However, if he stimulated two sets of neurons at two different frequencies, something unexpected happened: some arterioles would lock at one frequency and others would lock at another frequency, forming a staircase effect.

Submission + - US Declines To Join More Than 70 Countries In Signing UN Cybercrime Treaty (therecord.media)

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: More than 70 countries signed the landmark U.N. Convention against Cybercrime in Hanoi this weekend, a significant step in the yearslong effort to create a global mechanism to counteract digital crime. The U.K. and European Union joined China, Russia, Brazil, Nigeria and dozens of other nations in signing the convention, which lays out new mechanisms for governments to coordinate, build capacity and track those who use technology to commit crimes. [...]

While many countries did not sign the treaty, the most notable missing signature was that of the U.S. “The United States continues to review the treaty,” a State Department spokesperson said in a brief statement. The U.N. Convention against Cybercrime was adopted by the General Assembly in December 2024 and will enter into force 90 days after being ratified by the 40th signatory. Signatories will have to ratify the convention according to their own procedures.

[...] U.N. officials said the convention would help governments address terrorism, human trafficking, money laundering and drug smuggling, all of which have been turbo-charged by the internet. The U.N. noted that the convention is the first global framework “for the collection, sharing and use of electronic evidence for all serious offenses” — noting that until now there have been no broadly accepted international standards on electronic evidence. It is also the first global treaty to criminalize crimes that depend on the internet and is the first international treaty “to recognize the non-consensual dissemination of intimate images as an offense.”

Comment TypeScript (Score 4, Informative) 37

by JBMcB (#65762000) Attached to: TypeScript Overtakes Python and JavaScript To Claim Top Spot on GitHub
The problem is developers only know how to make websites now. The Windows app for my UPS is 300MB because it's an Electron app, so it has to run a couple of hundred megs of python and a node.js server to show me the last time my UPS tripped. I just use the built-in Windows battery thing now, but it doesn't keep track of battery health unfortunately.

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