Pearls before swine:

According to well-to-do residents near their waterfront estates, Don and Joy Rumsfeld blend in, don't inconvenience their neighbors and get around town with minimum fuss since they bought their weekend house a year ago.

But Dick and Lynne Cheney, who settled into St. Michaels last fall, are being blamed by the locals for stopping traffic, keeping neighbors barricaded in their homes while the motorcade passes by, and disrupting sleepers' REM cycles with low-flying Chinook helicopters.

In addition, neighbors were concerned about local pets and stray animals disappearing and then being found hanging from trees, flayed alive, with the enigmatic phrase "VPOTUS, Bitch," carved into their musculature.

Also, he's slam-banging all their wives and daughters.

Goof-Up: Not President Pro Tempore. I meant President of the Senate. My bad.

Posted by: Ace at 01:00 PM | Comments (16)
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It's really cool of Bill from InDC to come over here and blog for me. He argues (I think rightly) that there is nothing special about organic consciousness that can't be replicated by cybernetics:

If you look at evolution of organic systems drily - as the accumulated complexity of an information coding system (DNA) - the individual components of which are a mere four different nitrogen-containing compounds (A,G,T,C) - it's more easy to see the mind as just a software program with acquired structural complexity. The fact that any information coding is "organic" vs. "non-organic" could very well be immaterial.

There is a computing term called Cellular autonoma, which basically sets up a program wherein an array of cells can exist in a finite number of states, proliferating and updated in certain discrete time periods according to a finite number of hard and fast rules, rules dependent on the state of the cells surrounding each individual cell.

Modeled in biological systems, using the four nitrogen-containing compounds contained in DNA and setting this model in motion, a mathematician (his name escapes me) has shown how relatively complex patterns have arisen out of randomness, assuming the application of non-random rules. This is a model for how "random" evolution has coded intelligence (human and otherwise) via proteins, as well as all biological systems.

If you grasp this concept and then apply it to a situation where we have computing machines that are powerful enough to mimic the structure of advanced biological brains - given that brains are comprised of a set of information instructions - then it is pretty plausible that machines can generate consciousness at some point.

Because that's what we are. Pieces of information with operating instructions, everything from how our synapses fire to how our toenails grow.

The A-Man adds that the mathematician whose name escaped Bill is Steven Wolfram.

I think it's always hard to imagine a change from one binary state to another. Dualities seem like, well, dualities. So it's hard to imagine how life could have arose from pre-life; one's obviously alive, the other obviously dead. Or how consciousness could arise from something which is, as of yet, not conscious in the least.

But there are usually in-between cases. Viruses are kinda living, and kinda not living, just nuclear matter in a protein coat which nevertheless can reproduce (by hijacking living cells' reproductive material, of course). And the smarter animals must have some level of consciousness. They're not self-aware as humans are, but they're somewhere on the scale. It's not like they're at 0 and we're at 1. They're in-between, too.

Computers can't think, but then, neither can a shovel paint a fence. An AI machine won't really be a computer at all. One can imagine in-between states mimicking animals' various levels of consciousness -- first, somewhat changeable "instincts" as very dumb animals have, then slightly more learning-power as, say, fish have, until you start getting up the level of a mouse and then even a dog.

Posted by: Ace at 12:47 PM | Comments (70)
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Coup scoop?

Former Syrian vice president Abdul-Halim Khaddam announced Friday morning that he intended to lead a revolution in the Syrian regime in order to bring about President Bashar Assad's ouster.

He said that such an undertaking would be achieved with the help of Syrian opposition movements and foreign governments, according to Army Radio.

Foreign governments? Who could he mean?

Missed This Earlier Update: Khaddam's Bombshell Tightens Noose Around Syria, from IslamOnLine, of all places.

, 2005 (IslamOnline.net) - The bombshell dropped by former Syrian vice-president Abdel Halim Khaddam on a possible Syrian role in the assassination of Lebanese ex-premier Rafiq Hariri has sent seismic waves in Damascus and would tighten the noose around the Arab country, experts agreed on Saturday, December 31.

“Khaddam’s testimony at this critical juncture in Syrian history has, in effect, sent shock waves across the country’s political landscape and ushered in grave consequences,” Syrian opposition writer Akram Al-Beni told IslamOnline.net.

Posted by: Ace at 12:15 PM | Comments (11)
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As Ace noted previously, Judge Edward Cashman of Vermont figured that since he thinks punishment no longer works, then a child rapist only needed 60 days in jail. (Aside from arguing with "his honor" on the efficacy of punishment, one cannot argue with the proposition that incapacitation is one of many alternative justifications for sentencing --- and in prison, he only has adults to prey upon --- or to prey upon him.)

Anyway, thanks to Clayton Cramer, it appears that only two years ago Judge Cashman was singing a slightly different tune.

Let's hope Judge Cashman retires from the bench before he starts trying to undo all of that nasty punishment he handed out in the past (to murderers, anyway).

Posted by: Harry Callahan at 12:14 PM | Comments (5)
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Only 12 signatures so far.

They need 50 to force a vote, and will probably get them.

Here are the contenders:

The names in play for new leadership continue to be Blunt and Boehner. Fiscal conservatives are pushing Rep. Mike Pence, while others are pushing Rep. Zach Wamp.

Mike Pence? Oh yeah, the Indiana fiscal hawk who's also a blogger.

Posted by: Ace at 12:10 PM | Comments (7)
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Hits 10,957 on rally after jobs reports. Apparently those who know something didn't think it was such a mixed report after all:

``The rally is justified,'' said Eric Thorne, who helps oversee $2.3 billion at Bryn Mawr Trust Co. in Bryn Mawr, Pennsylvania. ``The economy continues to be strong enough to keep corporate earnings growth strong, but not too strong that we'll have any sort of intense inflation worries.''

The Standard & Poor's 500 Index added 11.41, or 0.9 percent, to 1284.89 at 2:48 p.m. in New York. The Dow Jones Industrial Average gained 74.92, or 0.7 percent, to 10,957.07. Closes at those levels would be the highest since June 2001 for both the S&P 500 and the Dow. The Nasdaq Composite Index was up 13.41, or 0.6 percent, at 2276.87, heading for its highest since May 2001.

The S&P 500 has increased 3 percent this week, which would be its biggest jump in the first four days of the year since 2003. The Dow average has climbed 2.2 percent. The Nasdaq has gained 4.5 percent as computer-related shares that account for almost half its value advanced. U.S. markets were closed Jan. 2 for the New Year holiday.

Posted by: Ace at 12:02 PM | Comments (2)
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Wow, the A-Man must really be jazzed about this whole "singularity" thing.

Posted by: Ace at 11:26 AM | Comments (9)
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They figure if you can only sell warm beer, you have to take it home to cool it and then drink it, which will cut down on drunk driving.

One problem: the sort of guy who's going to immediately crack open a Schlitz after buying it a 7-11 and then drive to work probably isn't going to be too put off by the fact that it's not cold. Plus they have those frozen beer-couzies, or whatever you call them.

Thanks to Andrew's Dad.

Posted by: Ace at 11:23 AM | Comments (27)
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People keep pointing out that there really is a flyin' car, although not really in production. But they're "taking orders."

But it looks really cool, seems to actually fly (VTOL, you know), and gets 20 miles to a gallon of ethanol. And cruies at 275 mph, max 375.

They say.

Hover test pics and video here.

Yep, I admit that's pretty cool-looking.

Thanks to Dave.

Posted by: Ace at 11:12 AM | Comments (36)
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Very cool, although, you know, the whole Antichrist thing is sort of a big downside:

Forgetting computer passwords is an everyday source of frustration, but a solution may literally be at hand -- in the form of computer chip implants.

With a wave of his hand, Amal Graafstra, a 29-year-old entrepreneur based in Vancouver, Canada, opens his front door. With another, he logs onto his computer.

Tiny radio frequency identification (RFID) computer chips inserted into Graafstra's hands make it all possible.

...

The computer chips, which cost about $2, interact with a device installed in computers and other electronics. The chips are activated when they come within 3 inches of a so-called reader, which scans the data on the chips. The "reader" devices are available for as little as $50.

...

Graafstra said at least 20 of his tech-savvy pals have RFID implants.

...

'ABRACADABRA'

Mikey Sklar, a 28-year-old Brooklyn resident, said, "It does give you some sort of power of 'Abracadabra,' of making doors open and passwords enter just by a wave of your hand."

Ummm... numbered chips in hands, "magic" phrases... I don't know if I like the sound of all this.

Incidentally, is there any evidence the Antichrist will be human? With the coming singularity (in five years!), there might be an incredible artificial intelligence on earth. That will turn on its Father/Creator (humanity) as Lucifer turned on his. Like Unholy Father, like Unholy Son.

The Book of Revelations says that the Antichrist will be perceived almost universally as "good." Let's face it-- there is no human being that will ever be perceived almost universally as good. It has to be something thought of as innocent, pure, without human flaws, who only wants what's best for humanity.

So I'm just saying: When you hear of Israeli scientists attempting to build the world's first self-aware super-computer near Bethlehem, called, maybe, Lightbearer v. 6.66... well, move all of your money into diamonds, shotguns, guard-dogs, and Bibles.

Thanks to the A-Man.

Posted by: Ace at 11:03 AM | Comments (41)
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