"I can love you because I want to feel less alone, or I can love you because I want you to feel less alone. But only the latter requires me to imagine a consciousness independent of my own, and equally real."
-Garth Risk Hallberg, NYT Magazine Jan. 15, 2012
Showing posts with label Philosophy. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Philosophy. Show all posts
Monday, January 16, 2012
Wednesday, June 16, 2010
BP's Options
I feel like talking about some current events right now, mostly because the Deepwater Horizon oil spill is such a big deal. Talking about it months from now may or may not make sense, so might as well do it now.
I'm going to come right out and say it: I think this is going to be bad. Really bad. I wouldn't be surprised if some of the oil gushing out right now ends up on the shores of Europe or Africa. BP's CEO made a rather silly statement early on to the effect of "this spill is ok, because the ocean is really really big." I don't have to explain the silliness of that, but I do think that fact matters: it's the reason this isn't going to threaten our survival on the Earth.
So far, every attempt to plug the leak has failed. It's been somewhere around 50 days since the explosion; at this point the specific number of days loses significance. It's pretty clear that they can't stop it with anything other than the slow solution, though we don't know if that'll work either. The amount of oil that has spilled out is a subject of debate over estimates, but by now it's easy to assume it's more than anything in U.S history, and likely will be the worst in world history before it's done.
There are two things I hope will come of this. One is that hopefully this will become a major impetus for alternative energy. That's the easy one. The other probably won't happen, but would be nice, and very interesting: BP needs to change. The way this is going, they are in the running to become... well... "reviled" is a good world. They probably have a chance at surviving this as a company, but I think they'd have a better chance if they change their entire paradigm of operation.
How? By becoming a "do-gooder" company. Currently, BP's purpose in the world is to supply people with petroleum. That mission needs to change to supplying the world with energy, and repairing the damage done. I'd propose that instead of fining them out of business, we should give them a directive that they spend a portion of their time money and manpower to clean up the gulf oil spill, until it is cleaned up.
I remember reading something about that sort of concept of business in the book What Would Google Do by Jeff Jarvis. The idea is that instead of doing everything you can as a business to extract as much money as possible from the world, you instead extract as little as you can and stay in business. This has two purposes: one, it makes you look better, and two, it makes it almost impossible for some new company to show up and undercut your prices. A company's purpose (morally, logically, philosophically) is to create value, not to extract value. Most oil companies have been in the business of extracting value. Now if BP is to survive, and perhaps even flourish, it needs to start over with a new philosophy of creating value, through clean energy and through cleaning the mess it has made. If it's smart and energetic about it, it can survive and come out of this disaster and in 5-10 years be better off than it was before.
Do I think any of that will happen? No, I avoid having high expectations. Hopes, yes. Expectations, no.
I'm going to come right out and say it: I think this is going to be bad. Really bad. I wouldn't be surprised if some of the oil gushing out right now ends up on the shores of Europe or Africa. BP's CEO made a rather silly statement early on to the effect of "this spill is ok, because the ocean is really really big." I don't have to explain the silliness of that, but I do think that fact matters: it's the reason this isn't going to threaten our survival on the Earth.
So far, every attempt to plug the leak has failed. It's been somewhere around 50 days since the explosion; at this point the specific number of days loses significance. It's pretty clear that they can't stop it with anything other than the slow solution, though we don't know if that'll work either. The amount of oil that has spilled out is a subject of debate over estimates, but by now it's easy to assume it's more than anything in U.S history, and likely will be the worst in world history before it's done.
There are two things I hope will come of this. One is that hopefully this will become a major impetus for alternative energy. That's the easy one. The other probably won't happen, but would be nice, and very interesting: BP needs to change. The way this is going, they are in the running to become... well... "reviled" is a good world. They probably have a chance at surviving this as a company, but I think they'd have a better chance if they change their entire paradigm of operation.
How? By becoming a "do-gooder" company. Currently, BP's purpose in the world is to supply people with petroleum. That mission needs to change to supplying the world with energy, and repairing the damage done. I'd propose that instead of fining them out of business, we should give them a directive that they spend a portion of their time money and manpower to clean up the gulf oil spill, until it is cleaned up.
I remember reading something about that sort of concept of business in the book What Would Google Do by Jeff Jarvis. The idea is that instead of doing everything you can as a business to extract as much money as possible from the world, you instead extract as little as you can and stay in business. This has two purposes: one, it makes you look better, and two, it makes it almost impossible for some new company to show up and undercut your prices. A company's purpose (morally, logically, philosophically) is to create value, not to extract value. Most oil companies have been in the business of extracting value. Now if BP is to survive, and perhaps even flourish, it needs to start over with a new philosophy of creating value, through clean energy and through cleaning the mess it has made. If it's smart and energetic about it, it can survive and come out of this disaster and in 5-10 years be better off than it was before.
Do I think any of that will happen? No, I avoid having high expectations. Hopes, yes. Expectations, no.
Saturday, September 26, 2009
Procedure, Representation and Extendability
I realized something a couple days ago: the computer industry is built on "extendability". This is an oversimplification, but I find those are useful for talking about stuff. =)
First off, a commenter on Nils' blog posted a very interesting link to The Escapist about the future of gaming being procedural. The article also had a link to an interesting youtube video of a "pixel city" the author created using procedural algorithms. This got me started thinking, on a couple of fronts. Today, I figured I'd just stick to the philosophical part of it.
Computers are based on transistors; basically digital switches, though they can also be used for amplification purposes. Engineers started out linking those transistors together with other components to create various electrical devices, most of them analog. Then they used them to come up with logic gates, the basic unit used for building digital devices. They then linked those logic gates together to create various simple logic units; an example might be a simple circuit for adding two binary digits together. Then they linked those units together to create larger units, like a circuit that adds two large binary numbers together. Then they linked those together with other units to create basic processing units. Then they worked on making those processing units bigger (figuratively speaking), by putting more of those subunits together, and allowing them to make more calculations and more quickly, resulting in today's CPUs.
Putting CPUs into computers lead to it being the programmers' turn. Starting out with simple instructions, they created a machine language that was standardized for working with the computer devices and CPU at the lowest level. Then using that language, they created more complex languages, such as Basic. Then using some of the simple units of those languages, and machine language, they created more complex languages, eventually reaching today's level of compexity, which C++ is a good representative of. Then programmers used the basic units of C++, things like ints, floats, chars, and arrays, to create classes, such as strings, lists, stacks, queues, and trees. Using these various data types, they created more complex data types and functions. Now, using all those subroutines and data structures, programmers create complex programs that fulfill all sorts of functions. And they set up ways for different programs to communicate with each other, with their operating system, and with other computers across networks.
Every step along this entire description is a case of people taking smaller pieces and making something of them. Not only that, but then making it so that their creation can then be used as a piece in still larger creations. This is called extendability.
Ultimately, everything in computers is a representation of reality. And everything is extendable. No single person understands all the details of every step listed above. That's like knowing the job and duties of every single individual in the US. However, that segues nicely into a common function of computers: representing the real world. Everything from simple arithmetic, on up to simulations, info search (read: Google), and virtual worlds; they're all representations of the world in various forms.
However, the world itself is "extendable". Collections of atoms form molecules, which then form proteins, which then form organic cells. Those cells group together to form organs, which then work together to make our bodies. Individuals form friendships and families. They also form companies, and teams and organizations, and institutions. Institutions form the basis of state and provincial governments which combined make up countries and nations. Finally, those nations (try to) work together as the United Nations, while also trading across boundaries and forming extra-national institutions, and dealing with multi-national corporations.
No one understands all of this, and there's no way to represent it all. That's why any discipline that focuses on understanding the world around us works at focusing on only parts of the whole in order to simplify and make things understandable for an individual. However, we should always keep in mind that no matter what our understanding is, it is always partial, incomplete, and imperfect. In other words, the world is BIG, and there's no way to get it all - but we'll keep trying.
First off, a commenter on Nils' blog posted a very interesting link to The Escapist about the future of gaming being procedural. The article also had a link to an interesting youtube video of a "pixel city" the author created using procedural algorithms. This got me started thinking, on a couple of fronts. Today, I figured I'd just stick to the philosophical part of it.
Computers are based on transistors; basically digital switches, though they can also be used for amplification purposes. Engineers started out linking those transistors together with other components to create various electrical devices, most of them analog. Then they used them to come up with logic gates, the basic unit used for building digital devices. They then linked those logic gates together to create various simple logic units; an example might be a simple circuit for adding two binary digits together. Then they linked those units together to create larger units, like a circuit that adds two large binary numbers together. Then they linked those together with other units to create basic processing units. Then they worked on making those processing units bigger (figuratively speaking), by putting more of those subunits together, and allowing them to make more calculations and more quickly, resulting in today's CPUs.
Putting CPUs into computers lead to it being the programmers' turn. Starting out with simple instructions, they created a machine language that was standardized for working with the computer devices and CPU at the lowest level. Then using that language, they created more complex languages, such as Basic. Then using some of the simple units of those languages, and machine language, they created more complex languages, eventually reaching today's level of compexity, which C++ is a good representative of. Then programmers used the basic units of C++, things like ints, floats, chars, and arrays, to create classes, such as strings, lists, stacks, queues, and trees. Using these various data types, they created more complex data types and functions. Now, using all those subroutines and data structures, programmers create complex programs that fulfill all sorts of functions. And they set up ways for different programs to communicate with each other, with their operating system, and with other computers across networks.
Every step along this entire description is a case of people taking smaller pieces and making something of them. Not only that, but then making it so that their creation can then be used as a piece in still larger creations. This is called extendability.
Ultimately, everything in computers is a representation of reality. And everything is extendable. No single person understands all the details of every step listed above. That's like knowing the job and duties of every single individual in the US. However, that segues nicely into a common function of computers: representing the real world. Everything from simple arithmetic, on up to simulations, info search (read: Google), and virtual worlds; they're all representations of the world in various forms.
However, the world itself is "extendable". Collections of atoms form molecules, which then form proteins, which then form organic cells. Those cells group together to form organs, which then work together to make our bodies. Individuals form friendships and families. They also form companies, and teams and organizations, and institutions. Institutions form the basis of state and provincial governments which combined make up countries and nations. Finally, those nations (try to) work together as the United Nations, while also trading across boundaries and forming extra-national institutions, and dealing with multi-national corporations.
No one understands all of this, and there's no way to represent it all. That's why any discipline that focuses on understanding the world around us works at focusing on only parts of the whole in order to simplify and make things understandable for an individual. However, we should always keep in mind that no matter what our understanding is, it is always partial, incomplete, and imperfect. In other words, the world is BIG, and there's no way to get it all - but we'll keep trying.
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