From extropians-request@extropy.org Fri Jan 21 02:42:17 1994 Return-Path: Received: from usc.edu by chaph.usc.edu (4.1/SMI-4.1+ucs-3.0) id AA18030; Fri, 21 Jan 94 02:42:15 PST Errors-To: Extropians-Request@gnu.ai.mit.edu Received: from news.panix.com by usc.edu (4.1/SMI-3.0DEV3-USC+3.1) id AA15562; Fri, 21 Jan 94 02:42:11 PST Errors-To: Extropians-Request@gnu.ai.mit.edu Received: by news.panix.com id AA25590 (5.65c/IDA-1.4.4 for more@usc.edu); Fri, 21 Jan 1994 05:03:41 -0500 Date: Fri, 21 Jan 1994 05:03:41 -0500 Message-Id: <199401211003.AA25590@news.panix.com> To: Extropians@extropy.org From: Extropians@extropy.org Subject: Extropians Digest X-Extropian-Date: January 21, 374 P.N.O. [05:01:15 UTC] Reply-To: extropians@extropy.org Errors-To: Extropians-Request@gnu.ai.mit.edu Status: RO Extropians Digest Fri, 21 Jan 94 Volume 94 : Issue 20 Today's Topics: ADMIN: List Changes (Legal & Pay for use) [1 msgs] Bandwidth Waster [1 msgs] Extropianism is *not* a religion. [2 msgs] Failure of Xanadu... [1 msgs] META: List Security [1 msgs] META: List Statistics [1 msgs] META: Re: Admin: List Changes (Legal & Pay for use) Pt II [1 msgs] Meta: Exi-UK annoucement [1 msgs] PRODUCT: Earthquake Shelters for the Home [2 msgs] Please ignore previous request for msg# [1 msgs] SOC: Extropian relationships [1 msgs] Self Awareness is Bunk [1 msgs] The singularity: the "so-so" future [3 msgs] The singularity: the so-so future [1 msgs] the 'so-so' future [1 msgs] Administrivia: No admin msg. Approximate Size: 53543 bytes. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Thu, 20 Jan 1994 07:19:45 -0500 (EST) From: "W. Blair Haworth Jr." Subject: Bandwidth Waster > 2) Anarchy for the US > > Thanks to the weather, the federal government is shutting down in DC > tomorrow. One down three hundred sixty-four to go. See if you notice any > difference. See if your life is worse tomorrow. Out of the corner of my ear, I believe I heard National People's Radio say that three hundred twenty-four thousand (324,000) non-essential federal personnel were ordered to stay home today. The corollary is left as an exercise for the reader.... --Blair bhaworth@acpub.duke.edu ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 20 Jan 94 12:15:51 GMT From: price@price.demon.co.uk (Michael Clive Price) Subject: The singularity: the "so-so" future Mark Plus, approvingly quoting Julian Simon: >>We now possess knowledge about resource locations and materials >>processing that allows us to satisfy our physical needs and >>desires for food, drink, heat, light, clothing, longevity ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ >> [again, Julian is wrong about this one -- MP], transportation, >>and the recording and transmission of information and ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ >>entertainment. ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ Dr Simon and Mark Plus are suffering from a failure of the imagination. Where did they get this list of "necessities" from? A distressingly modern view of the "bare necessities of life". Who _needs_ information and entertainment to _live_. Not your medieval peasant. > Perhaps many Extropians will hereafter view Dr. Simon as > "Julian the Apostate," Yup, a victim of his age - like most. > Unfortunately, I fear a great many Extropians will continue to > confuse convenience with necessity, You mean, like Julian Simon has done? Yesterday's convenience (like lighting) is today's necessity. I'm sorry to see Julian Simon spouting complete nonsense after his earlier, very good work on declining raw material scarities. > and be fascinated by > comparatively trivial advances which won't significantly alter > our lives. > For a really fundamental example, consider electricity. The > real cost of electricity has declined by about 90% (an order of > magnitude!) in this century. Whittling away at the remaining 10% > won't make that much economic difference. $%(&"*($)! Eh? If I have a factory budget for electricity then a drop in the "remaining" 10% by 9% is as economically significant as the original 90% drop. They are _both_ order of magnitude decreases. Each order of magnitude decrease means I can increase the quantity purchased by a factor of 10 (surprise, surprise!), ramp up production, reduce product price etc etc. Another real world example about "limits to growth": > Regarding (a), Drucker describes a company, "outsourced" by > a hospital to do cleaning, which has learned how to change the > sheets on a bed in a third of the time it used to take. I manage > a motel, so I find this plausible; some people clean rooms much > faster than others. But no matter how much experience this > company accumulates, it will never learn how to change a bed in a > *fiftieth* of the former time; it would have to do so to match > the revolution in manufacturing productivity. So this kind of > service productivity is facing some pretty hard constraints. What if advances in preventative medicine (like megadoses!) mean that you avoid hospital? Or that video conferencing mean that that business trip (and overnight stay in a motel) is unnecessary? Examples like this are like saying we've reached the limits of hot-air balloon technology and ignoring the possibilities of alternative ways (heavier than air flight) of satisfying needs. Again, failure of the imagination. I could go on, for each example, but you either catch my drift or not. Mike Price price@price.demon.co.uk ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 20 Jan 1994 09:21:17 CST From: "Kathleen Cadmus" Subject: SOC: Extropian relationships In Message Wed, 19 Jan 1994 17:53:00 -0800, vincek@netcom.com (Vince Kerchner) writes: >>On that note, best wishes to Vince and Romana in your quest! > >Thanks alot, Kathy, for letting the cat out of the bag :-(! > >But, now that Romana's and my passionate tryst is out in the open, we >should probably own up to it. I'm sorry Amara, I'm sorry Geoff. I'm >so ashamed. And we tried so hard to keep it from you. Although, >everyone else on the List knew (we even had Ray specifically alter the >List software to delay Amara's digests and to "mysteriously" omit >certain incriminating posts.) > I now have my lawyer checking out problems with being an accessory to alienation of affections! My humblest apologies to all for my absent-minded suggestion of cross-fertilization. May I extend the best wishes to all four of you (however and whether you choose to pair up!). I am very bad with names and faces. Without the faces I am hopeless. Maybe you could all send me .GIF files. (Maybe .GAF files would be more appropriate in my case.) Can I blame this one on the cold? ----- Kathy Cadmus (614)-846-3055 kcadmus@magnus.acs.ohio-state.edu ----- ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 20 Jan 1994 08:18:18 -0600 (CST) From: Craig Presson Subject: Extropianism is *not* a religion. According to T.C.May: > Max More writes: > > > supposed to be funny, I'm not amused. I tried hard to avoid religious > > That Max is not amused is not surprising. [...] > > Tim again: > > < The Principles are already creating a dogma. People attempt to win their > > < arguments by quoting from the Sacred Principles. > > > > Wrong again! The Principles are doing no such thing. They very deliberately [...] > (That is, when the Scholastics dogmatically cited Church writings, was > it the writings themselves or their use/misuse that created the dogma? > It was a _system_.) Nail on head, wham. [...] > appear every few months, the "Extropian diet" debates, and now the > "Extropian Relationships" business. Sounds like the cult of > Objectivism, or Scientific Socialism. Wham. [...] > > "religion", and "Holy Books". Nor do I appreciate being referred to as > > "The Mother Church in Riverside". I've become weary of insult poorly > > disguised as humor. Holy Bacon! Great Mambo chicken! I was sure "insult disguised as humor" was EC, and thin skin wasn't. Now I am soooo confused. > To each their own. If you don't like my posts, put me in your > ::exclude file, as I am now doing to your posts. > > --Tim May Ah, a schism! This proves it. Dogmatism is an attractor, you get caught up in the systematics, swirling down into the spin cycle of Extropian self-reference even while crying warnings to the spectators to choose a different parameterization. IMHO, Tim, switching off your opponent in the midst of a war of words is a lowbrow tactic. You, of course, may have so many WoW's going on that anything goes ... -- fcp@nuance.com (Freeman Craig Presson) 72430.1422@compuserve.com (Freeman P. Craig) LP of AL, LP US, NRA, ExI, ISGS, Clan Gordon ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 20 Jan 1994 08:38:40 -0600 (CST) From: Craig Presson Subject: Self Awareness is Bunk > Yes, we certainly would, in fact I don't see how we could move > at all, but its more than low -level i/o. If your correct I > don't understand why Feynman ,or some other genius didn't use > his communication skills to explain how at least his higher > level mind works. Then, because I have self knowledge (I already > have good low-level i/o) and am master of myself ,I should be > able to change am mental structure and become a genius like he > was. If your program works better than my program and now I > understand how they both operate I can bring out ver 2.0 . While the current level of human self-awareness is weak and undependable in the strict sense you are using, this does not mean that it will always be so, or that people are not working on the problems. Minsky, for example, gave a plausible architecture for the whole system; and many people are working on explaining various "low-level" functions in great detail through neurophysiology and simulations; then you have the "bold stabbers" like Lilly, RAW, Leary, etc., who "try something and see what happens". > Just about the last thing in the world I was trying to say, and > I think "non-sequitur" was a bit strong. I was trying to say > that it's odd nature didn't give us more self awareness if it's > useful or even possible. Nature is not as interested in the problem as we are. > mind works and I will understand exactly how your mind works but > we would still have only a vague idea how our own mind operates. By the time we understand all the details it won't matter whether the mind being understood is someone else's. Gaining the knowledge is certainly easier by looking out than in, but using it will probably be the reverse, especially if we choose to "instrument" our enhanced brains. Hell, I wouldn't want any computers in my head that didn't have good debuggers, having learned from the experience of the phase 1 meat module. -- fcp@nuance.com (Freeman Craig Presson) 72430.1422@compuserve.com (Freeman P. Craig) LP of AL, LP US, NRA, ExI, ISGS, Clan Gordon ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 20 Jan 94 15:00:57 GMT From: price@price.demon.co.uk (Michael Clive Price) Subject: Meta: Exi-UK annoucement Announcing the formation of Exi-UK. Exi-UK is for UK based extropians (although others can join if they wish). As in other Exi-local groups it is for local event and topics. It is a plain GNU remailer and will (probably) be low-volume and unmoderated. Let me know if you wish to join. Send me your email address and which address you wish to receive traffic on (if different). Mike Price price@price.demon.co.uk ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 20 Jan 1994 09:18:39 -0800 From: vincek@netcom.com (Vince Kerchner) Subject: Extropianism is *not* a religion. Many thanks to Max More for his eloquent and even-tempered post in response to several recent unwarranted allegations. This was a long time in coming. We should have more time and well-considered thought devoted to level-headed discussions of fundamental philosophical ideals and beliefs on this List, and less time and energy wasted on what amounts to childish, petulant, jingoism. Thanks again Max! * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * Vince Kerchner "We want information." Intergalactic Reality "You won't get it." vincek@netcom.com "By hook, or by crook, we will." Plan on file: "finger -lm vincek@netcom.com" Copyright V. Kerchner 1994 * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 20 Jan 1994 09:20:45 -0800 (PST) From: szabo@netcom.com (Nick Szabo) Subject: The singularity: the "so-so" future Mark Plus: > For a really fundamental example, consider electricity. The > real cost of electricity has declined by about 90% (an order of > magnitude!) in this century. Whittling away at the remaining 10% > won't make that much economic difference. There are a myriad of processes limited by the cost of electricity, including the manufacture of aluminum which is a staple for airplanes, automobiles, and much else. An order of magnitude drop in electricity costs would make possible an entire new family of of plasma processes, something like semiconductor processes scaled up to steel-furnance scales. Artificial environments like those in skyscrapers, malls, and Biosphere II are quite limited in their scope by the cost of air conditioning. Soon, computation itself may become limited by the cost of electricity -- air conditioning is already a big cost in supercomputer centers, and computer circuitry increasingly gulps and dumps watts as we minitiaurize. Reversible computation is only a partial solution. Nick Szabo szabo@netcom.com ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 20 Jan 1994 09:45:52 -0800 From: vincek@netcom.com (Vince Kerchner) Subject: The singularity: the so-so future In addition to the many industrial processes which would benefit from virtually free and unlimited electrical power which are mentioned by Nick Szabo, I would like to add one which I think is especially important. Large amounts of very cheap power would finally enable the construction and continuous operation of both Earth and Lunar-based electromagnetic orbital launching systems. To me, this is the single most important industrial/technological element necessary for the transition of the human race from a forever-gravity-well-limited culture to a true space-faring society. * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * Vince Kerchner "We want information." Intergalactic Reality "You won't get it." vincek@netcom.com "By hook, or by crook, we will." Plan on file: "finger -lm vincek@netcom.com" Copyright V. Kerchner 1994 * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 20 Jan 1994 10:03:24 -0800 (PST) From: tcmay@netcom.com (Timothy C. May) Subject: PRODUCT: Earthquake Shelters for the Home In the spirit of Vince Kerchner's quest for a marketable product, here's an idea I had. It's a bit iffy as to whether many would buy it, but what do you expect for free? (And it isn't software that Vince or anyone else could build, but my hunch is that there are few ideas we could casually come up with--that is, without the logical depth that comes from immersion in a product area--that would meet Vince's listed criteria.) Here's the idea: * a molded plastic/composite "box" that acts as an emergency shelter in an earthquake. * I envision something about 2 m long by 1 m by 1 m, perhaps "disguised" (or serving double-duty as a work table). If vertically oriented, it could be also used as a warddrobe or external closet. Cosmetic frill on the outside could lessen the visual intrusiveness of such a thing in a bedroom or playroom. (In the vertical orientation, it could be built-in to closets, allowing two adults and a few children to squeeze in.) * Internally, it would be of molded high-impact plastic, for cheapness and buckling strength. Kind of like the molded boxes one sees in hardware stores as work benches, tool carriers, etc. (Bulk is used for strength.) Children's playhouses are now often made this way, as my visits to toy stores have shown me. (My guess is that some of these playhouses, intended mostly for outdoor use, are better earthquake havens than tables, for example. The heavy plastic, cross-braced, should withstand falling roof material and possibly even falling roof beams. With additional engineering, a kind of "earthquake egg" should be possible.) * Children's molded playhouses appear to sell for around $200. This gives a baseline as to costs. With better bracing, or thicker walls, the cost may not be too much higher...perhaps $400. I suspect many folks in earthquake-prone regions would pay this for some peace of mind, even if largely illusory (given the times available to get to such an "egg," the freezing panic most people feel, etc....I need to be careful here in case any future liability lawyers are poring through these words looking for evidence that I, or others, treated the thing as a scam). * Having been through two major earthquakes (the 1971 Sylmar quake, though I was 80 miles away, and the 1989 Loma Prieta quake, where I was nearly at ground zero), I know there's not much time to get out of bed, or whatever, and get under a doorway. So I have no illusion that most people will be able to get into such a unit. But some could, and that may be enough to market a product. (I would think seriously about marketing it with a late-night "infomercial," showing a family running to their "Seismic Shelter" as the house begins to shake. The visual impact--and training value--of such an informercial may convince skeptical consumers. And direct marketing with direct shipment--a la QVC and other direct marketers--may work well.) * The idea is that in the 15-30 seconds of a big quake, folks would get into such a unit _instead_ of getting under tables (an inferior solution, unless the table is cross-braced and strong, as I envision this product would be) and "ride it out." Two adults and a child or two could likely squeeze into a unit the size I mentioned (selling one will be tough, selling multiples even more so, so plan on only selling one to a family--if that, of course). * A molded, cross-braced unit using only standard industrial plastics (no fancy Kevlars or Spectras, though "deluxe" and "svelte" models could be built that way) should ride out even a major building collapse of the sort just seen in Northridge. (Not skyscrapers, but ordinary wood-frame buildings, and perhaps limited amounts of falling masonry.) Even if a house "rolls," is should not seriously crush such an "egg." * The natural airspace inside should create enough of an airpocket, when combined with the additional surface area such an "egg" provides the occupant (for leakage of outside air through cracks, etc.), to keep occupants breathing for the first few hours of a quake. (Granted, the "Big One," a 7.5 or greater quake in a heavily populated area, will swamp rescue units. Most quakes are smaller, obviously.) * Various enhancements could be included. Interior padding. Emergency supplies in niches in the walls (to prevent rattling around and damaging occupants). Flashlights, a bit of food, water, etc. And, most importantly, a simple audio or radio beacon. A "thumper" that is hand-operated and that sends audio signals out could be useful. Or just a battery- or crank-powered audio amplifier, to allow shouts for help. The possibilities are endless, and should be left to the after-market. * Market as a safety product. Convince apartment owners to install in closets (the vertical orientiation I expect will be more popular, as it fits into closets easily). Life insurance companies might offer slight breaks (given the low probability of an earthquake death, and so forth) to owners. * Names? The aforementioned "Earthquake Egg." Or "Seismic Shelter." Well, that's the basic idea. I suspect someone could make some real money with this idea. In several years we may start seeing these for sale in local hardware and appliance stores. I'll take the same deal Vince offered if anyone pursues this idea. :-} That's all for now. --Tim May -- .......................................................................... Timothy C. May | Crypto Anarchy: encryption, digital money, tcmay@netcom.com | anonymous networks, digital pseudonyms, zero 408-688-5409 | knowledge, reputations, information markets, W.A.S.T.E.: Aptos, CA | black markets, collapse of governments. Higher Power:2**859433 | Public Key: PGP and MailSafe available. ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 20 Jan 94 09:57:26 -0800 From: davisd@auburn.ee.washington.edu Subject: META: Re: Admin: List Changes (Legal & Pay for use) Pt II > If you are removed from the list for violating our rules, your account > will be pro-rated and a refund will be sent. If you are removed from > the list because your mail is bouncing, and we are not able to > reconnect you because of problems at your site, we will also offer > >some form of refund. I assume that those who quit the list will also be refunded at a prorated basis - wouldn't want to encourage people to be jerkfaces just to get kicked off and receive their refund. Buy Buy -- Dan Davis ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 20 Jan 94 13:35:19 EST From: trestrab@GVSU.EDU (BETH TRESTRAIL) Subject: ADMIN: List Changes (Legal & Pay for use) I would appreciate it if someone would kindly forward to me the msg # of this message so I can have it resent. It was somehow truncated in transmission, and the mailer here won't display headers in a normal fashion so I never get to see the msg #s. Thanks. The message began: >Hi, > >It is my pleasure to announce some changes to the list. One of them >is a recent change in the legal system and the other is a long >awaited announcement of our pay for use system, which will >go into effect on Feb 1st. and ended (at least as I received it): >If you are removed from the list for violating our rules, your >account will Jeff trestrab@gvsu.edu ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 20 Jan 94 13:44:59 WET From: rjc@gnu.ai.mit.edu (Ray) Subject: META: List Security In the interests of stamping out future tentacles, I've been sketching some list security mechanisms to prevent forgery. Here's three currently or partially implemented features. o password on your list account. basically, you must include a ::pass at the beginning of any post. This has been in the software since day one, but it is optional for users, and the list admin can turn it off. o the "ergonomic method". Create a separate .sig for the extropians list and include an extra line containing an authentication. The incoming filters will strip this line so no one else sees it but the list. o the "heavy duty method" Incoming filters will catch a PGP/RIPEM message and autodecode/signature check it. (already implemented, but turned off because of the CPU it uses) With each method there would be three modes that each user can set for himself 1) reject any messages from his address without authentication 2) add a banner/header to your message saying that the message was authenticated, but do not stop unauthenticated messages from being processed 3) ignore all security (with authentication there is the possibility of anonymous posting being integrated, but also allowing users to exclude by authentication credential so accountability is retained but identity is protected.) (you may wonder why I've been making/proposing so many changes to the list software lately. I'm rushing to finish everything on my "to do" list before next semester starts. The "to do" list has been sitting around for months. I've written atleast 1000 lines of code in the last 2 days ;-)) Any PGP users interested in paying extra money (not much) for the "heavy duty method" (on an individual user basis) Now that the list has gone "pay mode", I need to protect users from potentially malicous hacking (such as mucking with user settings or corrupting the database) and at the same time, I should keep each user's accounting information in the database private from other prying eyes on the multiuser system panix (which has been hacked before). As a side benefit, when I eventually release the list software, it will already be cypherpunk ready. (a potentially interesting combination is the list software together with my anonymous forwarding software which could keep the e-mail addresses of the users on the list secret from everyone, even the list software and list admin himself. A bit of "crypto-overkill", but who knows, one day lists such as this might have to hide and protect their membership lists lest they be net-WACOed. ) Anyway, there's some food for thought. -Ray -- Ray Cromwell | Engineering is the implementation of science; -- -- rjc@gnu.ai.mit.edu | politics is the implementation of faith. -- ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 20 Jan 1994 10:07:47 -0800 From: 155yegan@jove.dnet.measurex.com (egan_t@measurex.com) Subject: the 'so-so' future Mark Plus speechifies: > First, the argument does not assume neo-Malthusian or >environmentalist limits; quite the contrary, as my starting >quotation from Julian L. Simon demonstrates. Granted. > Second, the argument looks at the USES of technology, rather >than the nature of the next, usually marginal, "advance" in the >state of the art. In most areas, the current level of technology >does the job "sufficiently well," as Dr. Simon says, so that >pushing technology to its ultimate limits won't really make that >much difference. It requires an appreciation of orders of >magnitude. Being able to reduce the time required to send a 100- >page fax from an hour to, say, five minutes, is a TRIVIAL ADVANCE >compared with being able to send a fax at all. (For some reason, >however, many Extropians tend to become enamored with the trivial >and the mendacious. At times they can remind of the Laputans in >Swift's GULLIVER'S TRAVELS.) Similarly, developing a faster >computer chip won't revolutionize current business uses of >computers. Sales of 486-based PC's didn't take off until they >came down in price to be competitive with 386-based PC's, which >is the market's way of saying that the additional speed did not >add that much value. I think the same thing will happen with >Pentium-based PC's. (After Intel takes the metaphorical bath in >the marketplace, it will much less willing to invest a lot of >money into developing the "Hexium" chip.) Most businesses are >not being significantly hampered by lack of computing power. I belive that you are slightly incorrect here. Sales of 386-based PC's didn't take off until they came down in price to be competitive with 286-based PC's, likewise with the previous versions of the processor. Also, new software has enabled many, many more people to do many, many more things much quicker ( cf Windows,Nextstep,System 7). If 1 person can do thing X at time 0 (and increase his/her productivity), 1 Mperson doing thing X at time 0+1 ( increasing their productivity), many more thngs get done. > Third, the rapid economic development of other countries >won't significantly improve the U.S. standard of living. If >anything, it could hurt it as we continue to lose industrial jobs >to various Koranistans and Banana Republics. Our industrial >unemployed will perforce have to enter the relatively >unproductive service job market and swell the ranks of the >impoverished "serviciate" class. I doubt Wal-Mart could absorb >them all. (Refer to my discussion of Peter Drucker's analysis of >service productivity in another posting.) If other countries improve their standard of living, US trade with these counties also improves; this improves our standard of living. > Fourth, if the dramatic drop in U.S. saving doesn't indicate >that Americans are satisfied with their current and expected >standards of living, what is your explanation for the phenomonen? Confiscatory income taxes at all levels of government. > Fifth, there remain the awkward facts of the general, post- >1973 slowdown in productivity and real income growth, as >described by Sylvia Nasar in her article in THE FORTUNE >ENCYCLOPEDIA OF ECONOMICS (a book advertised for sale in the >Laissez Faire catalog, by the way; it must agree with that >company's libertarian sympathies). I think it's happening >because economic growth is spontaneously ending, but I am open to >alternative explanations. Confiscatory income taxes at all levels of government. Over-regulation of industry. Massive and growing levels of government debt removing money from the money supply, thus preventing capital formation. This is why US economic growth is declining. >The real test for the "So-So" thesis, >however, will come when we look at Japan's economic situation in >about ten years. I predict that Japanese productivity growth >will follow the U.S. pattern and crawl along at 1% a year or >less, signaling the spontaneous emergence of an economic plateau >over there. I believe that your prediction will come true, but not for the reasons you state. The reasons will be as written above. >MARK ARISTOS PLUS, care of Scott Herman >70400.1036@compuserve.com >(619) 249-5450 Terry Egan ( egan_t@measurex.com ) ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 20 Jan 1994 10:55:20 -0800 From: vincek@netcom.com (Vince Kerchner) Subject: PRODUCT: Earthquake Shelters for the Home Tim May's idea for a product is a good one. However, as he points out, since quakes usually last only about 30 seconds at most (per individual shock), it is unlikely that one could actually use this product during the actual event. However, given the distruction and mayhem which result, marketing this product as a general emergency shelter might be a good idea. This would follow the same philosopohy as that which promoted home fallout shelters during the cold war, except that quakes do really occur. Although both state and private agencies recommend that private individuals prepare for such emergencies, I doubt that many really do. A simple shelter and set of necessities: non-perishable food, water, basic medical supplies, heat, light, radio, (weapons?), entertainment material, etc... packaged in a convenient single unit could probably be sold for up to $1000 or more. These items are all readily available from sporting/camping distributers like REI, so no new technology is required. The main focus here is that most people (a) don't want to think about this kind of thing, and (b) aren't willing to go out and get all these items themselves. Marketing strategies like "survive the big one" or "protect your family" would probably make big $. Personally, I wouldn't want to be involved in a product that only played on people's fears, but this one could probably be handled in a way that was really advantageous to many. Assuming you survive the actual event (most do), the biggest danger does appear to be lack of services after the event. This product could probably end up saving quite a few lives during the aftermath. * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * Vince Kerchner "We want information." Intergalactic Reality "You won't get it." vincek@netcom.com "By hook, or by crook, we will." Plan on file: "finger -lm vincek@netcom.com" Copyright V. Kerchner 1994 * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 20 Jan 94 13:54:10 EST From: trestrab@GVSU.EDU (BETH TRESTRAIL) Subject: Please ignore previous request for msg# Please ignore my previous request for the msg# of Harry's Admin: message. I got the resent version just after sending out my request. Jeff trestrab@gvsu.edu ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 20 Jan 94 13:56:25 WET From: rjc@gnu.ai.mit.edu (Ray) Subject: META: List Statistics Harry wanted me to send this to the list, so here it is. The text below is generated by one of the list daemon programs. It generates list statistics on a weekly basis, (usually Saturdays) although I forced it to start from last Thurday because it was recently updated. ----CUT HERE---- Weekly List Statistics for 1/14 to 1/20 Total Number of Messages Posted: 255 Total Size of Messages Posted : 730510 bytes Average Total Size per Day : 104358 bytes Average # of Messages per Day : 36 Average Message Size : 2864 bytes Number of Posters Participating: 63 Top Ten Posters by Frequency 1. vincek@netcom.com (23 total, 3.3/day, 9.0% of total) 2. tcmay@netcom.com (22 total, 3.1/day, 8.6% of total) 3. kwatson@netcom.com (19 total, 2.7/day, 7.5% of total) 4. rjc@geech.gnu.ai.mit.edu (18 total, 2.6/day, 7.1% of total) 5. smds!fnerd@uunet.uu.net (12 total, 1.7/day, 4.7% of total) 6. pgf@srl03.cacs.usl.edu (8 total, 1.1/day, 3.1% of total) 7. extropy@price.demon.co.uk (8 total, 1.1/day, 3.1% of total) 8. tsf@cs.cmu.edu (7 total, 1.0/day, 2.7% of total) 9. freeman@maspar.com (7 total, 1.0/day, 2.7% of total) 10. plaz@netcom.com (7 total, 1.0/day, 2.7% of total) Top Ten Posters by Volume 1. tcmay@netcom.com (88.9kbytes, 13003 bytes/day, 12.5% of total) 2. kwatson@netcom.com (69.0kbytes, 10095 bytes/day, 9.7% of total) 3. vincek@netcom.com (57.5kbytes, 8411 bytes/day, 8.1% of total) 4. rjc@geech.gnu.ai.mit.edu (42.1kbytes, 6160 bytes/day, 5.9% of total) 5. plaz@netcom.com (40.1kbytes, 5873 bytes/day, 5.6% of total) 6. smds!fnerd@uunet.uu.net (34.6kbytes, 5065 bytes/day, 4.9% of total) 7. davisd@u.washington.edu (24.4kbytes, 3567 bytes/day, 3.4% of total) 8. pgf@srl03.cacs.usl.edu (18.2kbytes, 2655 bytes/day, 2.5% of total) 9. freeman@maspar.com (18.0kbytes, 2627 bytes/day, 2.5% of total) 10. habs@sun.panix.com (17.7kbytes, 2582 bytes/day, 2.5% of total) Histogram of the week by number of messages +-------------+ Thu |13 | +-------------+ +------------------------------------------+ Fri |42 | +------------------------------------------+ +-------------------------------------------------------------+ Sat |61 | +-------------------------------------------------------------+ +----------------------------------------------------------------------+ Sun |74 | +----------------------------------------------------------------------+ +----------------------------+ Mon |28 | +----------------------------+ +-----------+ Tue |11 | +-----------+ +--------------------------+ Wed |26 | +--------------------------+ Histogram of the week by daily volume +-----+ Thu | |22496 +-----+ +------------------------+ Fri | |100953 +------------------------+ +---------------------------------------------------+ Sat | |210884 +---------------------------------------------------+ +-------------------------------------------------+ Sun | |203980 +-------------------------------------------------+ +----------------------+ Mon | |91685 +----------------------+ +--------+ Tue | |34843 +--------+ +----------------+ Wed | |65669 +----------------+ ----CUT HERE---- -Ray #4 poster ;-), back to your regularly scheduled discussion (I'll drop off the Top Ten when next semester starts in a week) -- Ray Cromwell | Engineering is the implementation of science; -- -- rjc@gnu.ai.mit.edu | politics is the implementation of faith. -- ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 20 Jan 1994 11:33:54 -0800 (PST) From: tcmay@netcom.com (Timothy C. May) Subject: The singularity: the "so-so" future I sent this message earlier, but have not seen it (though later-written messages have appared). I kept a copy, as I am now doing for all mail sent to the list, and will try here to get it through. As Ray noted, it may be Netcom or it may be Panix; I'm not getting bounce messages, so something's definitely not working the way it should. From: tcmay (Timothy C. May) Message-Id: <199401201832.KAA13093@mail.netcom.com> Subject: Re: The singularity: the "so-so" future To: extropians@extropy.org Date: Thu, 20 Jan 1994 10:32:54 -0800 (PST) Cc: tcmay (Timothy C. May) Nick Szabo writes: > air conditioning. Soon, computation itself may become limited by the > cost of electricity -- air conditioning is already a big cost > in supercomputer centers, and computer circuitry increasingly > gulps and dumps watts as we minitiaurize. Reversible computation > is only a partial solution. Not exactly. Computer circuitry _does not_ increasingly gulp and dump watts, the recent experience with the DEC Alpha and Intel Pentium not withstanding. Speeds of transistor processes are generally increasing with the square of the scale factor, and so is overall power dissipation (with number of tranistors roughly scaling with the square of the scale factor). How much power budget is allotted to a design is dominated by _packaging_ condiderations, e.g., the thermal resistance of the package (measured in degrees of chip-to-case temp rise per watt) and in external cooling (air cooling, heat sinks/fins, etc.). For many years, the basic power budget has been about 2-6 watts per main microprocessor...this allowed maintenance of the chip temperatur to less than 80 C or thereabouts, with minor efforts at cooling (a simple fan, for example). Recent chips have pushed this to 10-15 watts, with more sophisticated package cooling schems (fins on top of packages, special packages, etc.). And reductions of chip operating voltage, not lightly taken (for reasons of compatibility with a 5-volt world, largely), allow the power per chip to be scaled down. The latest Pentium operates at 3.3 volts, with a power dissipation of approximately 6-9 watts, I understand. Back into the "easily cooled" regime, and faster in operation (80 MHz or better). In any case, MIPS per watt has been increasing consistently for the past few decades. My 1977-era "Sol" PC used an 8080A with a fraction of a MIPS of performance, but was scorching to the touch--so much so that I had to add a large aluminum heat sink to its surface (stuck on with Dow-Corning heat sink compound). A few years later, my 8088 CPU was noticeably cooler, and my 68030 cooler still. All with more MIPS. And if scaling in all 3 dimensions is done (which means lowering operating voltages of course), the power will scale as the cube of the scale factor, just as the speed increases linearly and the number of devices in a unit area increases with the square. Hence, roughly constant power (which will, for physical heat-carrying reasons with today's epocy and alumina packages, be about 3-15 watts, depending on cleverness and additional heat sinks). In summary, computers are a real bargain when it comes to power use. In a world of 100-watt incandescent light bulbs all around us, the 5 watts a modern CPU uses--or even the 13 watts that an early Pentium uses--is not a big deal. Packaging costs grossly dominate the cooling problem, not electricity costs. --Tim May -- .......................................................................... Timothy C. May | Crypto Anarchy: encryption, digital money, tcmay@netcom.com | anonymous networks, digital pseudonyms, zero 408-688-5409 | knowledge, reputations, information markets, W.A.S.T.E.: Aptos, CA | black markets, collapse of governments. Higher Power:2**859433 | Public Key: PGP and MailSafe available. -- .......................................................................... Timothy C. May | Crypto Anarchy: encryption, digital money, tcmay@netcom.com | anonymous networks, digital pseudonyms, zero 408-688-5409 | knowledge, reputations, information markets, W.A.S.T.E.: Aptos, CA | black markets, collapse of governments. Higher Power:2**859433 | Public Key: PGP and MailSafe available. ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 20 Jan 1994 11:57:06 -0800 From: tribble@netcom.com (E. Dean Tribble) Subject: Failure of Xanadu... Phil Fraering says (and I see Dean Tribble hasn't responded): Apologies. I thought I had included this thread. I'd appreciate someone forwarding me any other messages that I might have missed on this thread. > Since it wasn't viable for them to have a Compuserve or Netcom-like > service where dial-in users could provide revenue, they had (or so > I had heard) been speculating on having a storefront-type hypertext > access system, sort of like the computers you can rent at Kinko's. > (I am not sure those would be a going concern if it weren't for the > other infrastructure at Kinko's, like four-color printers.) The Xanadu people were referring to here (XOC) was not in the public access business at all. We were creating a hypermedia database engine that such a public access service could be built on. That was not even the target market for XOC (while ill-defined, XOC was targetted at supporting collaborative teams). > Does anyone know if their ideology would have allowed them to license > their software to someone else with a substantially different business > plan? I've forgotten what I knew about their ideology... Our ideology included licensing to the devil for the right terms :-) Ted's ideology on the other hand is that he wanted to build a public access service his one-true-way, so he had kept the rights to that application when the techn ology was licensed to XOC. This restriction was one ofthe major stumbling blocks to getting further funding for XOC at the beginning of 1993: everyone who was interested had things that could quickly lead into public access services, and so couldn't accept that restriction. XOC, the development company, was doing just this, developing a server for customers to use as they wished. The big Xanadu network was going to be just one user of the technology. Yes. dean ------------------------------ End of Extropians Digest V94 #20 ********************************