tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6096844366367766843.post2027398324521806334..comments2024-03-27T09:27:33.931+00:00Comments on Idiotic Hat: Sell Your ClevernessMike C.http://www.blogger.com/profile/11279776665185060446noreply@blogger.comBlogger11125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6096844366367766843.post-59549173813563285292017-07-31T14:38:08.456+01:002017-07-31T14:38:08.456+01:00Also:
"At the highest levels, the Chinese Pe...Also:<br /><br /><i>"At the highest levels, the Chinese People’s Liberation Army (PLA) also recognizes and intends to take advantage of the transformation of today’s informatized (信息化) ways of warfare into future “intelligentized” (智能化) warfare."</i><br /><br />https://lawfareblog.com/alphago-and-beyond-chinese-military-looks-future-intelligentized-warfare<br /><br />But note <br /><br /><i>"However, for the time being, AlphaGo represents a high-profile demonstration of the sophistication of U.S. AI."</i><br /><br />should read <br /><br /><i>"[...] <b>U.K.</b> A.I."</i><br /><br />(AlphaGo's developer, Deepmind, is a British startup, sold to Google -- with riders -- so as to be able to use their network to power it.)Zouk Delorshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07983226210415857258noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6096844366367766843.post-7133212038272335812017-07-29T17:24:10.922+01:002017-07-29T17:24:10.922+01:00Zouk,
Exactly, couldn't have put it better my...Zouk,<br /><br />Exactly, couldn't have put it better myself!<br /><br />MikeMike C.https://www.blogger.com/profile/11279776665185060446noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6096844366367766843.post-45375444382326369392017-07-29T15:38:56.990+01:002017-07-29T15:38:56.990+01:00https://nytimes.com/2017/06/24/opinion/sunday/arti...https://nytimes.com/2017/06/24/opinion/sunday/artificial-intelligence-economic-inequality.htmlZouk Delorshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07983226210415857258noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6096844366367766843.post-89343914886694616112017-07-29T14:58:22.655+01:002017-07-29T14:58:22.655+01:00Odd, isn't it? As a self-taught amateur, I act...Odd, isn't it? As a self-taught amateur, I actually enjoyed writing APIs, Perl programs and CGI stuff to keep my colleagues happy and gainfully employed, but started to feel overwhelmed when XML, "web services", smartphones and such came along. It's gone the way of car maintenance... No point in getting out the feeler gauges and getting your hands oily, sir, it's a sealed unit and will need complete replacement by a specialist.<br /><br />But those overly-complicated meals... I remember those! Mine are 23 and 26 this year, and can cook their own damn meals...<br /><br />Mike Mike C.https://www.blogger.com/profile/11279776665185060446noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6096844366367766843.post-27468421710143364142017-07-29T14:18:04.899+01:002017-07-29T14:18:04.899+01:00Hah!
I retired (early, I am a trifle younger than...Hah!<br /><br />I retired (early, I am a trifle younger than you) a year and a few months ago. I look after children, cook, clean, and occasionally bloviate. I also retired from Writing Code, and have also written exactly zero lines of code since I hung it up. Well, I do go fill in the bits and pieces of a div tag from time to time as part of bloviating (blogging) but not one bit more.<br /><br />It truly is exhausting to "keep up" these days. I still watch the industry, and I am daily very happy not to be in it. Even after a long and horrid day of chasing grouchy little kids around and cooking overly complicted meals.<br />amolitorhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/15743439184763617516noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6096844366367766843.post-27148123763457670182017-07-28T11:25:40.112+01:002017-07-28T11:25:40.112+01:00Chris,
Thanks for these thoughtful comments. Yes,...Chris,<br /><br />Thanks for these thoughtful comments. Yes, of course, I exaggerate a little, but every step along the road to "efficiency" (container shipping ... wordprocessing ... now driverless vehicles ...) has made some group of ordinary folk redundant. My point is that people need meaningful work to do, and yet so much ingenuity goes into taking it away, and putting nothing in its place. What is a strong young man of average or below intelligence and no desire to work in an office or warehouse supposed to do with his life?<br /><br />The irony is that those of us who have worked with IT are both responsible for much of this and at the same time most acutely aware of it -- my 35-year career spanned the eras of 80-column punched cards and developing apps for smartphones!<br /><br />MikeMike C.https://www.blogger.com/profile/11279776665185060446noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6096844366367766843.post-64767307785409383072017-07-28T10:32:42.360+01:002017-07-28T10:32:42.360+01:00Mike, further to your comments on AI, I think we&#...Mike, further to your comments on AI, I think we're all overblowing that group of technologies. I remember on definition a few years ago, to the effect that AI is the name for a set of applications that we haven't really solved yet, with the implication that once the problem had been solved it moved out of the realm of AI into the ordinary. We seem to have moved a bit beyond that. But I did much enjoy Andrew Molitor's piece on Automation, at http://photothunk.blogspot.co.uk/2017/07/automation.html . The key bit: <br /><br />'There's no "person" in there in any meaningful sense, and in fact nobody knows how to even get started making a software "person." This does not appear to be a current area of study. The software that turns your spoken words into text has no relationship with the software that plays chess at a Grand Master level. The phrase "neural network" does not mean that the software resembles a brain in any meaningful way, the phrase just means another remarkably simple algorithm (inspired by real neurons) which can produce useful results.'<br /><br />So, not that we shouldn't worry, but not to worry about that, yet.<br /><br />On a different note, I had a bit of that working on redundant systems: in 1971 I was sent to Australia by ICL to help write 1900 DBMS software. We had a team of up to 50 and worked on it for 3 1/2 years, and in the end nothing was released, the project was abandoned and we were all made redundant! A bit depressing. But it does remind me that the skills of programming and project management are generally quite advanced compared to the... perhaps art? or craft? ... of future project risk assessment!<br /><br />"There's never time to do it right, there's always time to do it over"... the old ones are the good ones! ;-)Chris Rusbridgehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/06087447503626434385noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6096844366367766843.post-54854646915821175742017-07-28T09:53:34.976+01:002017-07-28T09:53:34.976+01:00Martin,
Indeed. Repeat after me: First, [etc.] .....Martin,<br /><br />Indeed. Repeat after me: First, [etc.] ...<br /><br />MikeMike C.https://www.blogger.com/profile/11279776665185060446noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6096844366367766843.post-83299110795191237372017-07-28T08:50:41.066+01:002017-07-28T08:50:41.066+01:00Ha! You've reminded me of my 18 month exile *a...Ha! You've reminded me of my 18 month exile *ahem* I mean secondment, to CAMS. There, we built an online postgraduate research prospectus from scratch, and within a few short months of completion, it was all but dumped. Staggering waste of time and money. See also, the ill-fated Learning Centre. What was that all about? Martinhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/13494219959077922220noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6096844366367766843.post-30717538699208985762017-07-27T23:14:48.402+01:002017-07-27T23:14:48.402+01:00Thomas,
Ouch, indeed. You'll know you're...Thomas,<br /><br />Ouch, indeed. You'll know you're getting old when the thought of learning just one more new language -- or even just coping with one more upgrade to your familiar environment, with its usual round of broken tools, "deprecated" routines, new bugs, unwanted features -- just makes you feel tired...<br /><br />So, repeat after me: "first, all your achievements are ephemeral, to be washed away in the next tide of change and, second, nobody understands or cares what you have done, anyway"... ;)<br /><br />Mike Mike C.https://www.blogger.com/profile/11279776665185060446noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6096844366367766843.post-20566372101515581182017-07-27T22:46:32.259+01:002017-07-27T22:46:32.259+01:00Mike,
incidentally, just this week there was an a...Mike,<br /><br />incidentally, just this week there was an advanced-level C++ training at work which I organised for our department. I hired the well-known expert Angelika Langer as instructor, and since we've been very satisfied with her in the past, I asked her whether she was willing to hold another training covering the new C++11 standard. I was told that nowadays C++ is so low in demand that she can't make a business case for preparing such a training.<br /><br />Ouch. Apparently we're building our careers on a "legacy" language.<br /><br />On the other hand, the skills you name in your post - planning a project, breaking tasks down into manageable bits, keeping a mental map in your head *are* software engineering. These are much more important than keeping up with the newest platforms, languages and APIs. By the way, I believe that they are also fundamental for successful artmaking.<br /><br />Best, ThomasAnonymousnoreply@blogger.com