Thursday, March 17, 2011
MIT-Designed Game Used To Train an AI System
Posted by Soulskill
from the i'm-sorry-dave-i-win-again dept.
Ian Lamont writes"MIT Media Lab and the Singapore-MIT Gambit Game Lab have just released Improviso, an online game that is part of a research project to create a more realistic game AI. Improviso requires two players, a Lead Actor and Director, who pretend to shoot a low-budget science fiction movie about a government cover-up of aliens at Area 51. The goal of the project is to gather recorded improv from thousands of games, which can be used to train an AI system that will be able to play the role of NPCs. Jeff Orkin, the MIT researcher who led game development, says that the best time to play Improviso is between 7 pm and 10 pm. Orkin is also the creator of a game AI called goal oriented action programming, first used in F.E.A.R. in 2005 and later employed inF.E.A.R. 2 and Fallout 3."
Large Hadron Collider is a Time Machine?
Posted by CmdrTaco
from the summon-michael-j-fox dept.
MistrX writes"If the latest theory of Tom Weiler and Chui Man Ho is right, the Large Hadron Collider – the world's largest atom smasher that started regular operation last year – could be the first machinecapable causing matter to travel backwards in time."
Large Hadron Collider is a Time Machine?
Posted by CmdrTaco
from the summon-michael-j-fox dept.
MistrX writes"If the latest theory of Tom Weiler and Chui Man Ho is right, the Large Hadron Collider – the world's largest atom smasher that started regular operation last year – could be the first machinecapable causing matter to travel backwards in time."
Wednesday, March 16, 2011
Tai Chi Beats Back Depression in the Elderly, Study Shows
ScienceDaily (Mar. 16, 2011) — The numbers are, well, depressing: More than 2 million people age 65 and older suffer from depression, including 50 percent of those living in nursing homes. The suicide rate among white men over 85 is the highest in the country -- six times the national rate.
NASA Wants To Zap Space Junk With Lasers
Posted by samzenpus
from the space-sharks dept.
Hugh Pickens writes"MIT Technology Review reports that various ideas have been floated for removing space junk, most of them hugely expensive, but now James Mason at NASA Ames Research Center has come up with the much cheaper option of zapping individual pieces of junk with a ground-based laser, to slow them down so that they eventually de-orbit. Mason estimates that a device to test the reversal of the Kessler syndrome could be put together for a million dollars, which would have to be shared by many space-faring nations, to avoid the inevitable legal issues that using such a device would raise. 'The scheme requires launching nothing into space — except photons (PDF) — and requires no on-orbit interaction — except photon pressure. It is thus less likely to create additional debris risk in comparison to most debris removal schemes,' writes Mason. 'Eventually the concept may lead to an operational international system for shielding satellites and large debris objects from a majority of collisions as well as providing high accuracy debris tracking data and propellant-less station keeping for smallsats.'"
Sun.com, the twelfth oldest domain on the internet, will be decommissioned on June 1st
By Vlad Savov 
posted Mar 16th 2011 1:08PM
Japan Earthquake May Have Shifted Earth's Axis
Posted by CmdrTaco
from the buy-a-new-clock dept.
Zothecula writes"Using a complex model to perform a theoretical calculation based on a US Geological Survey, Richard Gross of NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory has determined that by changing the distribution of the Earth's mass, the earthquake that devastated Japan last Friday should have sped up the Earth's rotation, resulting in a day that is about 1.8 microseconds (1.8 millionths of a second) shorter."
Tuesday, March 15, 2011
Boss Quotes
By working faithfully eight hours a day you may eventually get to be boss and work twelve hours a day. ~Robert Frost
I've met a few people in my time who were enthusiastic about hard work. And it was just my luck that all of them happened to be men I was working for at the time. ~Bill Gold
One measure of leadership is the caliber of people who choose to follow you. ~Dennis A. Peer
Accomplishing the impossible means only that the boss will add it to your regular duties. ~Doug Larson
Ability is what will get you to the top if the boss has no daughter. ~Author Unknown
Nothing so conclusively proves a man's ability to lead others as what he does from day to day to lead himself. ~Thomas J. Watson
If a trainstation is where the train stops, what's a workstation? ~Author Unknown
Monday is a lame way to spend 1/7 of your life. ~Author Unknown
The best leader is the one who has sense enough to pick good men to do what he wants done, and self-restraint enough to keep from meddling with them while they do it. ~Theodore Roosevelt
Most people like hard work. Particularly when they are paying for it. ~Franklin P. Jones
Don't worry about people stealing your ideas. If your ideas are any good, you'll have to ram them down people's throats. ~Howard Aiken
If you had to identify, in one word, the reason why the human race has not achieved, and never will achieve, its full potential, that word would be "meetings." ~Dave Barry, "Things That It Took Me 50 Years to Learn"
The difference between a job and a career is the difference between forty and sixty hours a week. ~Robert Frost
I've met a few people in my time who were enthusiastic about hard work. And it was just my luck that all of them happened to be men I was working for at the time. ~Bill Gold
One measure of leadership is the caliber of people who choose to follow you. ~Dennis A. Peer
Accomplishing the impossible means only that the boss will add it to your regular duties. ~Doug Larson
Ability is what will get you to the top if the boss has no daughter. ~Author Unknown
Nothing so conclusively proves a man's ability to lead others as what he does from day to day to lead himself. ~Thomas J. Watson
If a trainstation is where the train stops, what's a workstation? ~Author Unknown
Monday is a lame way to spend 1/7 of your life. ~Author Unknown
The best leader is the one who has sense enough to pick good men to do what he wants done, and self-restraint enough to keep from meddling with them while they do it. ~Theodore Roosevelt
Most people like hard work. Particularly when they are paying for it. ~Franklin P. Jones
Don't worry about people stealing your ideas. If your ideas are any good, you'll have to ram them down people's throats. ~Howard Aiken
If you had to identify, in one word, the reason why the human race has not achieved, and never will achieve, its full potential, that word would be "meetings." ~Dave Barry, "Things That It Took Me 50 Years to Learn"
The difference between a job and a career is the difference between forty and sixty hours a week. ~Robert Frost
Monday, March 14, 2011
Ever watched the 60's batman and played SMB2?
If you are one of the 15 or so who have, you might get a kick out of this gif.
Beijing to track individual movement through cell phones
Published 14 March 2011
Beijing could soon track the daily movements of seventeen million residents by tapping into their cell phones; authorities have proposed a program designed to help ease traffic congestion by providing up to the minute data on an individual's movements; critics say that this is an attempt by authorities to prevent large crowds from forming; the proposed plan comes as Chinese officials have grown increasingly worried about domestic unrest in light of the mass protests sweeping across the Middle East; Chinese police forces turned out in full force after anonymous calls for mass protests were posted online; the government has also placed more than eighty activists under house arrest while others have gone missing.
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