Fwd: [IP] Re Read re Losing a Generation of Scientists

[Steve Smith]

> Perhaps it was just incredibly fortunate for us that those people—Licklider, Kahn, Cerf and others—were in a position at a special time to make a dream come true. They had the ways and means to spend money, and spent it pretty wisely. Everything the pioneers did wasn’t successful—a big, expensive time-share project at MIT/Bell Labs fizzled. But like commercial ventures, what was successful was spectacularly so.
>
> Perhaps the founding of the Internet was something like the founding fathers of this country, the constellation of minds formed at just the right moment, with just the right sensibilities. Perhaps it has nothing at all to do with which kind of organization, commercial or governmental, is the midwife.
Pamela -

I do think these convergences are interesting and suspect that they are
relatively robust...  if one of the "founding fathers" had been absent
for whatever reason, it seems likely that our history might have been
almost identical...  another of the "fathers" might have championed that
missing person's pet causes... changing only the attribution, not the
fact of those elements?  Perhaps.

Technological growth/evolution seems similarly robust.  Most of us
probably read descriptions of new technology being invented every day
and think "I thought of that 10 years ago!",  which isn't the same of
course, as doing it, but I'm pretty sure that anything that *I* thought
of has been thought of by at least 1% of the tech population as well.  
So as low probability as that might be, it is not low frequency...   the
niche is (apparently) there begging to be filled!

- Steve

>
>
> On Mar 4, 2014, at 2:50 PM, Marcus G. Daniels <[hidden email]> wrote:
>
>> On 3/4/14, 11:33 AM, glen wrote:
>>> Although I haven't participated, I think we can learn quite a bit from the outright generosity shown by Kickstarter participants.
>> To me it is important to believe there are things inherently worth doing, and that there is someone that wants to do them and a means to get them done.   With government funding and venture capital, the money is mostly controlled by certain types of people with certain types of values.   Those kinds of people won't pursue the diversity of possible innovations, and they aren't the `best' in any absolute sense nor `deserve' the control they have.   They are just fit for their environment.   So to me it's no more generosity than donating to a political campaign, it's just that these technical campaigns actually might modify the world slightly, should they succeed.
>>
>> Marcus
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
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[Steve Smith]

Glen -

>>> Although I haven't participated, I think we can learn quite a bit from
>>> the outright generosity shown by Kickstarter participants.
>>
>> To me it is important to believe there are things inherently worth
>> doing, and that there is someone that wants to do them and a means to
>> get them done.
>
> I can't help but notice you edited out giving money to the homeless...
> Don't you think hanging out on the street drinking cheap wine is
> inherently worth doing? [*]
>

I do it at home every night myself.  In fact I hear Charles Shaw calling
my name from across the room... I can't wait until his viticulturists
start editing in firefly sequences so I can drink it in the dark after
the electric grid crashes!
>
> [*] Yes, I know this is a callous, unfunny, joke, indicative of my
> old-white-man prejudices ... but I couldn't help it.  It's a problem.
> I'll have to bring it up with my therapist.
I don't think you qualify as *old* white man... a bunch of us have a
number of years on you... heck I think a good chunk has a number of
years on ME!

Which is a good time to make the point that Stephen Guerin turns 46 next
week...  time for a good Razzing I'd say!

- Steve


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[glen ropella]

On 03/04/2014 04:54 PM, Steve Smith wrote:
> I do it at home every night myself.  In fact I hear Charles Shaw calling
> my name from across the room... I can't wait until his viticulturists
> start editing in firefly sequences so I can drink it in the dark after
> the electric grid crashes!

I will be happy to donate to your efforts when/if you visit.  But I'm
not very charitable... I usually end up consuming most of my donations
myself.  As for glowing beverages and/or plants, when/if we can make
them blink or change color in sync with the music, then I'm definitely
in.  Or, better yet, perhaps we can find some psy ravers willing to take
some of that DNA.  <http://youtu.be/TrKIhoRn3Gw>  A literal injection of
diversity.

> Which is a good time to make the point that Stephen Guerin turns 46 next
> week...  time for a good Razzing I'd say!

That's it, man.  it's over.  It's all down hill now!

--
⇒⇐ glen e. p. ropella
Silver women on the OMNI magazine


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[Steve Smith]

>> Which is a good time to make the point that Stephen Guerin turns 46 next
>> week...  time for a good Razzing I'd say!
>
> That's it, man.  it's over.  It's all down hill now!
I did take the moment to list off for him, all the things that I lost or
which fell apart or which went to hell just as *I* was turning 46... I
find that people younger than me find it really uplifting when I do
that.   My daughters went so far as to change their birthdays to secret
dates they don't share with me, just to avoid that kind of talk...




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