Archive for the 'Ideas' Category

Energy efficiency through transgenics

Published
by
Distraction
on 11/07/2008
in Ideas
. 0 Comments

In a previous post, I wrote:

There are many animals that see in the dark. If we could somehow extract this “night-seeing” property of animals and add it to our genome, then we could significantly reduce global warming! Think about it. If we can see in the dark, then we can turn the lights off!

Well, I had another idea along the same lines. Electric fish can generate electric fields. If we could generate electric fields to charge our laptops, mobile phones, and the like, we would significantly reduce our fossile fuel consumption.

The possibilities are limitless!

Open State

Published
by
Distraction
on 08/07/2008
in Ideas and Politics
. 0 Comments

You’ve heard of Open Source, right? Why not Open State?
It’s a simple idea.

Your average western government consists of the following four elements:
1. The Politicians
These are our elected representatives. They are members of a legislature. They are our congressmen, senators, presidents, prime ministers, ministers, members of the parliament. I say our, because, even though it is not relevant to this proposal, we should always remember they are our employees.

For the sake of simplicity, I will not address the issue of bicameral legislatures possessing a chamber of appointed, as opposed to elected, members. I hope it will become evident that such legislatures could also adopt this proposal without any problems.

2. The Beaurocrats
Barring politicians, these are all the people on the government’s payroll. They consist the machinery of government.

3. The Law
With “The Law”, I mean all legislation, and the constitution.

4. Operational processes
Operational processes are the processes that define the day-to-day life of the politicians, and the bueaurocrats. These processes include - by my definition - everything from purchasing paperclips for a minister, to making appointments, archiving documents, taking minutes, and so on. Every procedure and everything that leaves a paper-trail is an operational process.

That’s it. That’s all a government is: politicians, beaurocrats, laws, and operational processes.

If it is true that we can define a government this way, if all governments can be described by these elements, then we can work out an abstract unified government model and use it to build a single software application to automate every government function.

Here’s why we would want to do that: It would allow us, the people, to easily audit the government. We would be able to see how our money is spent and why, and it would force the government to be more efficient and accountable. After all, it would be that much easier for the opposition to demonstrate that replacing workflow X with workflow Y would increase performance and decrease costs and waiting times. Also, it would allow us to simplify the law. The law is too complex. A typical article of law refers to tens of others of articles of law. With the right software, we could easily track down the references, find the dead ends, the redundancies, the cyclic references, and so on. We could actually make it possible for people to know the law.

Of course, the model and the software should be open source so that everyone can suggest improvements and corrections. I already have a name for the application: “Open State”. It’s short and simple and it feels appropriate. But if you have a better name for it, please let me know. Names are important.

As with all software projects, acceptance is very important. It’s especially important in this case, I think. After all, this software would - by design - make the lives of people in government more difficult. To make acceptance somewhat more easier, and difficult to decline, we would have to make sure that the software is modular. It should not be an all-or-nothing deal, at least not at first. The next step would be to get an international think-tank started with the mandate to promote the acceptance of the software. The think-tank would organize international concert & media events with rock-stars and ex-politicians saying what a great idea it is, it would have a website where people can download draft letters to their congressmen and MPs - that sort of thing.

Who knows, maybe some day.

A monopoly of magic

Published
by
Distraction
on 08/06/2008
in Ideas, Journal, Philosophy and Thoughts
. 0 Comments

Religion sell magic: gods, demons, angels, miracles… Well, not quite: Religion does not sell real magic. Rather, it sells comfort and solidarity to those who want to believe in magic. You pay now, but you don’t get the magic now - miracles don’t happen when you want them, after all. What you get is the promise that your beliefs will be verified to you after you die.

Science neither makes nor tolerates such nefarious promises. And science does deliver true magic: artifial limbs, airplanes, automobiles, computers, internet, vaccines - the list is enormous. Furthermore, it exposes religion for the dubious promise, human weakness, and unsupported belief it is.

This, I think, is where science and religion conflict. Science infringes on religion’s market. The appeal of the deliverables of science is too great, and its rewards are obvious and immediate. In contrast, religion is chain-bound to its one and only proposition: “Pay now, receive when you are dead.”

Photosynth & HTM

Published
by
Distraction
on 20/04/2008
in Ideas and Technology
. 1 Comment

Someone should put Numenta HTM and Photosynthtogether. I think HTM could speed up the process of finding associations between pictures, and probably also reduce the capacity demands. Just an educated guess, of course.

Global forum on politics

Published
by
Distraction
on 17/04/2008
in Ideas and Politics
. 0 Comments

“Transparency” - There’s a word not often heard from the mouths of politicians, unless it’s directed at the opposition. Who are these people who govern us? We do not know. We know all too little about their beliefs, their goals, their actions, their failures, and their successes. We need to know, for we have given them the power to govern over us.

So let’s keep tags on them. Let’s collect information about them, let’s share the information we have. Let them not hide anymore from us behind the power we have given them.

If you agree, then you should consider the following idea. Let’s setup a wiki where people can collect information on parties, politicians, and high government officials from every government in the world. Let’s publish their CVs on the internet, and let’s talk about what they do and have done. There should be forums, articles, pictures, and videos.

Let politicians be haunted and humbled by their failures, and let them take pride in their successes. Let them know the true burden they carry. The established media have too short a memory and attention span. We should not.

“Realpolitik”: The Show

Published
by
Distraction
on 17/04/2008
in Ideas and Politics
. 0 Comments

Idols, Big Brother, Fame Factory etc.

Their effect on their public is clear: Disillusionment. It’s hard to stay spellbound by a person, by a celebrity, when you’ve seen and heard them bickering for hours on end on television.

Sure, you will enjoy the entertainment and the schadenfreude. Perhaps you will vote, talk about the show with your friends, or buy the CD (if applicable) when it comes out. At some point, however, you will lose interest in the people, for you will have seen them for what they are. They are people, just like you. The mysterious spell of the celebrity will have been broken. All things considered, only the truly talented or charismatic will stand the test of time.

In the words of Aesop, “familiarity breeds contempt”.

So how about a Reality show about an MP, a senator, a congressman or -woman - a Prime Minister even? Perhaps an “El Presidente”? It may not be as popular as Idols - I can’t imagine it holding the interest of 11 year-olds unless it’s also combined with song & dance, or X-Factor-like challenges, but it will be viewed, I think, by voters of all ages. They are the demographic I am interested in.

There are two ways to do this, and I’m sure you’re familiar with them.

The first one is a 24 / 7 dive into the life of an elected official. We get to see how they treat their spouse and children, what they do in the office, and so on.

The second one is a competition open only to people who have never run for any office before, but who will be candidates in the next elections, pre-approved by major parties. They get to debate each other and to answer questions from the public, be interviewed by seasoned journalists, and so on. They must pledge to remove their candidateship if they get voted off.

Familiarity does breed contempt, and we need to be at least as contemptuous of politicians, our employees, our civil servants, as they are of us.

And I have the name for the show : Realpolitik.

GM, a solution for global warming

Published
by
Distraction
on 20/01/2008
in Ideas, News and Technology
. 1 Comment

Every now and then I read the news, and an interesting story catches my eye. Here’s an interesting one:

Scientists at the company, Stemagen, which is based in San Diego, said Thursday that they were the first to use human adult cells to create cloned embryos that advanced to the stage known as a blastocyst, from which embryonic stem cells typically are extracted.

There must be something to it, because the Vatican was quick to condemn it:

“This ranks among the most morally illicit acts, ethically speaking,” said Monsignor Elio Sgreccia, president of the Pontifical Academy for Life, the Vatican department that helps oversee the Church’s position on bioethics issues.

The story got me thinking about GM - not just about blastocysts and stem cell research, but about GM in general.

And I had an idea.

There are many animals that see in the dark. If we could somehow extract this “night-seeing” property of animals and add it to our genome, then we could significantly reduce global warming! Think about it. If we can see in the dark, then we can turn the lights off!

Mature Human Embryos Created From Adult Skin Cells
Cloning Said to Yield Human Embryos
Vatican condemns cloned human embryo research