And one, two, three...singularity here we come!

1950s:

"One conversation centered on the ever accelerating progress of technology and changes in the mode of human life, which gives the appearance of approaching some essential singularity in the history of the race beyond which human affairs, as we know them, could not continue." -- Stanislaw Ulam, May 1958, referring to a conversation with John von Neumann

In 1965, statistician I. J. Good described a concept even more similar to today's meaning of singularity, in that it included in it the advent of superhuman intelligence:

"Let an ultraintelligent machine be defined as a machine that can far surpass all the intellectual activities of any man however clever. Since the design of machines is one of these intellectual activities, an ultraintelligent machine could design even better machines; there would then unquestionably be an 'intelligence explosion,' and the intelligence of man would be left far behind. Thus the first ultraintelligent machine is the last invention that man need ever make."

1993: Vinge's essay "Technological Singularity" contains the oft-quoted statement that "Within thirty years, we will have the technological means to create superhuman intelligence. Shortly thereafter, the human era will be ended."

2001: n his essay, The Law of Accelerating Returns , Ray Kurzweil writes: An analysis of the history of technology shows that technological change is exponential, contrary to the common-sense "intuitive linear" view. So we won't experience 100 years of progress in the 21st century -- it will be more like 20,000 years of progress (at today's rate). The "returns," such as chip speed and cost-effectiveness, also increase exponentially. There's even exponential growth in the rate of exponential growth. Within a few decades, machine intelligence will surpass human intelligence, leading to The Singularity -- technological change so rapid and profound it represents a rupture in the fabric of human history. The implications include the merger of biological and nonbiological intelligence, immortal software-based humans, and ultra-high levels of intelligence that expand outward in the universe at the speed of light.


2005: So where are we now? Check the recent (April 23rd) New Scientist: Whatever happened to machines that think? In the next few months, after being patiently nurtured for 22 years, an artificial brain called Cyc (pronounced "psych") will be put online for the world to interact with. And it's only going to get cleverer. Opening Cyc up to the masses is expected to accelerate the rate at which it learns, giving it access to the combined knowledge of millions of people around the globe as it hoovers up new facts from web pages, webcams and data entered manually by anyone who wants to contribute. Crucially, Cyc's creator says it has developed a human trait no other AI system has managed to imitate: common sense. "I believe we are heading towards a singularity and we will see it in less than 10 years," says Doug Lenat of Cycorp, the system's creator.

It is close. Every day, it gets closer. Today? Tommorow? Next decade? I don't know about you, but I *am* expecting to see Singularity during my lifetime...

My hero

Well, at the very least a person that I can call my role-model. Do check the Economist article 'The future, just around the bend' about Ray Kurzweil.

A year in review OR a new mission statement

This entry I will do something I rarely do: I will write a little about myself. Please bear with me - at least if you want to know the reason for lack of updates over the past weeks and what is likely to happen next. If you are a causal - or first time - reader, I invite you to go throug archieve instead, as most of my entries are more interesting then this, and few lose their relevance.

It has been a year since I started this blog. A lot has happened since then. A year ago, I had just obtained my MA in Economy, I was torn between looking for job, looking for a doctorate and just 'living the life'. One of the reasons that made me start this blog was my desire to keep contact with other human beings, since I lost touch with majority of my student-day collegues. Another was because I believe I had something to share with you - something interestign along the lines of various reviews, ideas, links and such.

Now many of this has changed. I am pursuing a doctorate, which does take some of my time (and is likely to take even more with time) and I discovered an apparently better venue for my desire to contribute to others - meaning you - the Wikipedia. While this blog has received at best a little over 50 hits per months, my Wikipedia contributions, especially my eight (so far) Featured Articles, had been viewed by scores of thousands. I would like to take this moment to thank all of my readers - you, again - especially Jason C, the only person who more or less regulary commented on my posts, and therefore is the only person I can actually name and thank in person (I could try to make an educated guess based on some IPs, but if you want to remain anonymous, well, it is your choice :) ). You were the reason that kept me blogging, hoping to make your time visiting this site worthwile. But web gravitation - and simple common sense - made me spend more and more time on Wiki, were my contribution is simply much more valuable - instead of being of mild interest to few dozens of people, it is of use to many many more.

What I want to say, basically, is that barring any comments on your side, I will likely settle on blogging once per week or less. I simply don't think this is useful anymore - to me or you - compared with what I (and you) can do with our time on Wikipedia.

Feel free to drop here again. I will likely post, as always, various trivia and useful links that I think are important - or just *so* funny. Or anything you request. Just no so often as I used to.

Take care and visit my Wiki homepage to check on my most recent articles!

Something begins, something ends

It is nice to see something one helped to create grow. And no, I am not talking about Wiki this time. Check Worldcon blog entry on Games Research Association of Poland.

In other news. A great man has passed away. I am sure you know who I mean. But still, you may want to check His entry on Wiki. In Poland, I have seen many mourning flags and such. And I have heard - seen, read - that it is common in many other parts of the world. I wonder if any other person alive today could commend such loyality...or love? Truly, the Pope was the friend of us all.

April Fools and assorted wisdom

Wikipedia:Bad jokes and other deleted nonsense

Got me ROTFLOL for a long, long time. Now it is your turn!

One can wish...

...for more often updates, perhaps? Well, I guess not. Still, I have not abandoned the blog. Just that I am busy working on Wiki (and my doctoral studies seem to have finally picked a pace up...more on that later).

Central and Eastern Europe have been a site of much war and destruction over the last few hundred years. But in alternate history, this could have been different, for example, if one man dream would have became a reality:

In 1919 Józef Piłsudski envisioned a federation (the "Federation of Międzymorze"), a Polish-led confederation comprising Poland, Lithuania, Ukraine and other Central and East European countries now emerging out of the crumbling empires after the First World War. The new union would have had borders similar to those of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth in the 15th–18th centuries; and it was to be a counterweight to, and restraint upon, any imperialist intentions of Russia or Germany. It might have made central Europe into a "Third Europe" invulnerable to Poland's historic antagonists, Germany and Russia.

It might have. It didn't, since it never happened. Soviets pulled all strings they could to prevent this. Western Allies feared that weakened Germany and Russia may not be able to pay First World War reparations, and that the balance of power in Europe would be offset too much by the newly independent countries. Lithuanians, Ukrainians and many other nations that were approached for entry into the Miedzymorze federation were afraid of any compromise limiting their own, dearly awaited independence, and in many cases had good reasons to be wary of Poland, as various border conflicts and even all-out wars divided their new, respective governments (especially the Polish-Lithuanian War, Polish-Ukrainian War and border conflicts between Poland and Czechoslovakia). Finally, many Polish politicians like Roman Dmowski were opposed to the idea of multi-cultural federation, prefering the creation of nationalistic, pure-ethinic Polish country. Eventually, Piłsudki's dream was lost in the aftermath of the Polish-Soviet War, and the alliance between Central and Eastern European countries was never formed. Less then two decades after Piłsudski first articulated the proposal, and five years after his death, all of the countries that so persistently guarded their independence were again swallowed by their neigbours - Germany and the Soviet Union.

One can only wonder what would our world look today if Piłsudski's dream became a reality. I can't help but think that for the war ravaged European countries this alternative world would be a better one...

Wikipedia Publishes 500,000th English Article

Press release:

The Wikimedia Foundation announced today the creation of the 500,000th article in the English-language Wikipedia, its project to create a free, multilingual, online encyclopedia. The article was about "Involuntary settlements in the Soviet Union (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Involuntary_settlements_in_the_Soviet_Union)." Wikipedia is a comprehensive online reference that has won acclaim and awards (http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Trophy_box) for its detailed coverage of current events and popular culture, its usability, and its community of contributors. It receives millions of visits each day.

Other recent additions to its English-language edition include hundreds of full-length songs (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Sound/list), almost a gigabyte of new images (http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Main_Page), and subject-specific portals (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Wikiportal/Art).

Daniel Pink, author and WIRED Magazine columnist, recently described Wikipedia as "the self-organizing, self-repairing, hyperaddictive library of the future." BBC News calls it "One of the most reliably useful sources of information around, on or off-line," and Tim Berners-Lee, father of the Web, has called it "The Font of All Knowledge."

Wikipedia is the first and best-known project of the Wikimedia Foundation. It has spawned sister projects, including a dictionary, a library of textbooks, a compendium of quotations, and a news site. These projects are all run on the open source MediaWiki platform (http://wikipedia.sourceforge.net/).

Wikipedia is available free of charge and free of advertising from its website, en.wikipedia.org. Interested contributors can visit http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Introduction to learn how to add to the encyclopedia. DVD versions of the encyclopedia are scheduled to be released in English, German (http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Wikipedia-Distribution), and French, later this year.

Why ebooks are GOOD

It sounds bizarre, but giving something away for free is ahttp://www.blogger.com/img/gl.link.gif
insert link good way to make profit. A contradiction? No.

Read Building the , and don't forget to check the Ghostwheel!

Nice reading...and buying :D

The Daily .WAV

Found a new site. Nifty. The Daily .WAV. Title sais it all. Enjoy!

The Daily .WAV


"I am Susan Ivanova, Commander, daughter of Andre and Sofie Ivanoff. I am the Right Hand of Vengence. . .and the boot that is going to kick your sorry ass all the way back to Earth, damnit. I am Death Incarnate and the last living thing you are ever going to see. God sent me."

Anybody wants to guess where is this quote from? :)

Free Antivirus

It is worth following Sourceforge Projects of the Months. Each of them represents the best of open source community. And this month we got a real treat: a free antivirus, ClamWin:

ClamWin A Free Antivirus For Windows

ClamWin is a Free Antivirus for Microsoft Windows 98/Me/2000/XP/2003. It provides a graphical user interface to the Clam AntiVirus engine.

ClamWin Free Antivirus uses the GNU General Public License by the Free Software Foundation and is free (as in freedom) software. To find out more about GNU General Public License and what it entitles you to, please visit the following link: Philosophy of the GNU Project - Free Software Foundation.

ClamWin Free Antivirus comes with an easy installer and open source code at no cost. It features:

• Scanning Scheduler;
• Automatic Virus Database Updates. ClamAV team updates Virus Databases on a regular basis and almost immediately after a new virus/variant is out;
• Standalone Virus Scanner;
• Context Menu Integration to Microsoft Windows Explorer;
• Addin to Microsoft Outlook.

The latest version of Clamwin Free Antivirus is 0.83 (click on this link for more information.

Gotta love open source. Now, where can I find good oo firewall?

Gallery update

I've updated my honorverse gallery with many new Honorverse-based pictures. Enjoy!

Here is one my favourites:

Donate to Wiki

Imagine a world in which every person has free access
to the sum of all human knowledge. That's what we're doing.

And we need your help.

Fund drive goal: $75,000 (USD) $33,393.02 to go.

Good anime

I have discovered an interesting thing. More to the point, a new anime, definetly worth watching to all fans of good space combat.

Target destroyed!

Starship Operators is an anime (so far 4 eps have been released) about a single spaceship fighting a war after the main fleet has been destroyed and their country has surrendered. So far, every episode has a nice one on one battle, with a nice array of weapons (including asteroid throwing ship), decent tactics (how to spot a stealth ship or close to a long range ship) and character development. I had some doubts after the 1st episode if the story would hold, but after the 4 eps I am definetly hooked up and want more.

The crew

Btw, they finally managed to explain why we can hear sound in space...

Target spotted

Since the show is not licensed outside Japan, episodes can be downloaded from animesuki. Catch them when they are available!

Official site, probably nice...if you can read Japanese :D; some tech pics under mechanics section, character sections has character pics and bios.

Seaslug Team has pics and spoilers, be warned!
http://www.davidslife.com/anime/reviews/starship_operators_1.php (pics and review)

Your standard blurb on animesuki.

REPORT FROM THE BESIEGED CITY

My favourite poem.

"REPORT FROM THE BESIEGED CITY" (1982) by Zbigniew Herbert

Late update

Almost a week with no updates - that is rare even for me. I was waiting for the replies to the quiz...got none :(

Well, no replies - I am not telling you the answer then. Over the next few days I'll be at Krakonsci-fi con, so expect few updates (please note...if you want more updates, all you gotta do is *ask* :D).

Quiz question nr 3: Who and when wrote the oldest alternative history?

News...or no news

Today's news...well, I am not a journal. But I can point you to 2 very interesting news sites. You probably know the first one, as I mentoned it already: Wikinews. Well, Wikinews is interesting, but atm it is far from comprehensive (although it is growing rapidly). Now, the second site is probably more widly known: one of Google spin-offs, Google News. What it does it offers you a search (suprise...) for the latest news on a given topic. A nice thing, give it a try - or check the most recent news article about Wikipedia :) Btw, I had a really good laugh reading the 'Guide to a smarter you' . Although, on a second thought, this should be obligatory subject in schools...well, perhaps with the exception of visitng Fark.com :>

With accordance to the rules, I am extending the last queston deadline until I get at least one answer...

Game round two

So, answers to yesterday's quiz.

Zepplin answer: TRUE

Winner: Noah and Flow, who voted true. Although none of you were very convincing :D

Rule update: only answers in the blog comments section or send to me by mail are counted. I don't mind if you send me sth on ICQ or etc., but don't count I will remember who send what few hours later. My memory is not what is used to be... :> To find my mail, click 'About me' on the left panel.

From my favourite source: Zeppelin article on Wiki

While Germany determined the Zeppelin would be obsolete for military purposes in the coming war and concentrated on the development of airplanes, the United States pursued a program of military zeppelin construction even though it had not developed a clear military doctrine for Zeppelin use. At the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor on 7 December 1941 that brought the United States into World War II, it had 10 pressure zeppelins:

• 4 K-class US Zeppelins: K-2, K-3, K-4 and K-5 designed as a patrol zeppelins built from 1938.
• 3 L-class US Zeppelins: L-1, L-2 and L-3 as small training zeppelins, produced from 1938.
• 1 G-class US Zeppelin built in 1936 for training.
• 2 TC-class US Zeppelins that were older patrol zeppelins designed for land forces, build in 1933. The US Navy acquired them from Army in 1938.

Only K and TC class zeppelins could be used for combat purposes and they were quickly pressed into service against Japanese and German submarines which at that time were sinking US shipping in visual range of US coast. US Navy command, remembering the zeppelins anti-submarine success from WWI, immediately requested that new modern anti-submarine Zeppelin and on [2 January]] 1942 formed the ZP-12 patrol unit based in Lakehurst from the 4 K zeppelins. The ZP-32 patrol unit was formed from 2 TC and 2 L zeppelins a month later, based at US Navy (Moffet Field) in Sunnyvale in California. A zeppelin training base was created there as well.

In the years 1942-1944, approximately 1400 zeppelin pilots and 3000 support crew members were trained in the military zeppelin crew training program and the zeppelin military personnel grew from 430 to 12400. The US Zeppelins were produced by the Goodyear factory in Akron. From 1942 till 1945, 154 zeppelins were built for the US Navy (133 K-class, 10 L-class, 7 G-class, 4 M-class) and 5 L-class for civilian customers (serial number L-4 to L-8).

The primary zeppelin tasks were patrol and escort of ships near the coastline. They also served as an organisation center for the convoys to direct ship movements and course, and were used during naval search and rescue operations. Rarer duties of the zeppelins included aerophoto reconaissance, naval minelaying and minesweeping, parachute unit transport and deployment, cargo and personnel transportation. They were deemed quite successful in their duties with the highest combat readiness factor in the entire US airforce (87%). They were extremely successful in their primary goal of anti-submarine warfare as the below numbers ilustrate:

• 1942: 454 ships sunk near the US coat, 4-13 zeppelins in service
• 1943: 65 ships sunk near the US coat, 17-53 zeppelins in service
• 1944: 8 ships sunk near the US coat, 56-68 zeppelins in service
• 1945: 3 ships sunk near the US coat, 53-48 zeppelins in service

Not a single ship from a convoy escorted by zeppelins was sunk. Zeppelins engaged the submarines with depth charges, or rarely from other onboard weapns. They were very successful since they could match the slow speed of the submarine and bomb it until its destruction. Additionally, sumberged sumbarines had no means of detecting a zeppelin approaching.

Only one zeppelin was ever destroyed by U-boot: on the night of 18/19 July 1943 a K-class zeppelin (K-74) from ZP-21 division was patrolling the coastline near Florida. Using a radar, the zeppelin located a surfaced German submarine. Due to the failure of the depth charge release mechanism, the Zeppelin was unable to release the bombs during the bombing run and the German returned fire. The (K-74) received serious damage and was forced to make a water landing. The crew was rescued by patrol boats in the morning, but one crewman died from a shark attack. The U-Boat responsible was sunk a few hours later.

Some US zeppelins saw action in the European war theater. The ZP-14 unit operating in the Mediterranian area from June 1944 completely denied the use of the Gibraltar Straits to Axis submarines. Zeppelins from the ZP-12 unit took part in the sinking of the last U-Boat before German capitulation, sinking U-881 on 6 May 1945 together with destroyers Atherton and Mobery.

Now, for the question #2:

Look at the picture below and tell me, what in the world is going on there? The person who answers with the description closest to the real historical event, gets the prize. Of course if sb manages to find EXACTLY the event in question, the better.

Rules of the Game

All right, I decided to do something to this blog to make it more fun than it already is - yes, I know it is a challenge, but it can be done! :D

Seriously. In addition to my normal posts, the game will be based on what I posted yesterday about Zeppelins. So:
* every day (more or less...) I will post a question. After 24h AND after I receive at least one reply, I will post the answers. There will be Hall of Fame for the players, and we can discuss the prizes later (for example, blog links exchange, etc.).

Answer to the Zep question coming in <12h. Yep, that means 2 updates in one day. Aren't I full of surpises today? :D

Zeppelins

Fascinating topic. But let's keep this short today - I'll ask you a single question and you reply 'True' or 'False'. Answer is coming tommorow.

Question: Did USA use zeppelins extensively during the Second World War?

Prize is...well, you post, you tell me what you want, I'll see what can be done.

U.S. Navy Zeppelin ZRS-5 "USS Macon" over Moffett Field in 1933

World War Two: The Game

The blogger seems to be having trouble with html coding today, so no pic in this update. and if the links is butchered, you know who to blame :> Today's theme is: the coolest game simulating WW2. Whether you remember the Panzer General times and dreamed of a full world map lile me, or just like strategy game - this is one good piece of work!

With a demo to download: Hearts of Iron


And if you manage to defend Poland in '39 I'll give you a present :)

PS. It appears that the popularity of this blog is slowly increasing (see Stat4U link below if you don't believe me, it is non-passed). I am happy that some of you find my ramblings somewhat useful D Feel free to use comment button for some feedback! <- Yes, this is a hint.

Be seeing you!