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Scientia Weaponizes The Future

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RabidMushroom said:
A lot of the technological 'naysaying' in this thread seems somewhat analogous to a late 1500's early 1600's scientist denying the possibility of a horseless carriage because it isn't possible to get useable work out of a windmill attached to a cart, completely ignorant of the upcoming revolution of the first steam engine, then internal combustion, and ~500 years of progress advancing material sciences and physics research leading to the creation of a viable Windmill powered car.

The society that taylor is drawing from is so old that 500 years of advanced is almost immeasurably small in comparison, and they have been actively progressing their understanding of the universe that entire time as far as we are aware. The real life progress of technology has been advancing faster with every passing year, and to my knowledge every prediction of technological progress slowing down has been wrong save for some individual fields falling by the wayside in favor of newer more promising fields.
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If you're referring to my 'Prometheus is impossible' argument then your analogy doesn't really work. it's more like the 1600s scientist saying that while a windmill car might be possible, it won't be able to go faster than sound in low wind conditions in the typical countryside.

Also, i actually argued that while Prometheus is too bullshit for that civ, the rest of the tech isn't bullshit enough. Assuming you're referring to me anyway.

By the way, referring to people in general from a position appearing to be outside the discussion while you're also adding your own opinion to it is pretty rude.

Anyway i said everything i wanted to say so I'll just go back to lurking now.
 
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Aineko said:
The origin civilization doesn't appear to have anything like the Entities' dimensional nonsense.

I'm not inclined to blame them for that considering how thoroughly the Entities' dimensional nonsense is nonsense, though from within a setting where we know that works it is presumably something they could have gotten.
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It does seem like the origin civilization would have figured out the Entity's dimensional shenanigans long ago if it were at all possible to do so within the laws of physics, doesn't it?

There's an answer to that particular Gordian knot coming up. Shoferi's been working on it.
 
TaliesinSkye said:
I don't think those are the only things she runs on; remember that she started out as a home personal assistant for Richter.
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Aineko said:
Oh. Why bother? Neurons don't seem to be particularly exciting computational material.
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I always read the wetware processors as a workaround for Dragons processing speed limiter. If you can't clock up, maximize the number of cores, and what's a neuron but the messiest processing core developed by evolution itself?

They're generally specialized, relatively slow by computing standards, and small enough that you can cram tens of billions of them into a conveniently head sized computer, any losses you get due to specialization can simply be brute forced over by sheer numbers.

That's how I've always seen it, might be totally off though.
 
Omegaprime02 said:
I always read the wetware processors as a workaround for Dragons processing speed limiter. If you can't clock up, maximize the number of cores, and what's a neuron but the messiest processing core developed by evolution itself?

They're generally specialized, relatively slow by computing standards, and small enough that you can cram tens of billions of them into a conveniently head sized computer, any losses you get due to specialization can simply be brute forced over by sheer numbers.

That's how I've always seen it, might be totally off though.
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I think that's a really clever interpretation that didn't occur to me.
 
komandorcliff said:
About the layers, one thing i keep wondering is if using defined layers in our neural networks is actually the correct approach. Organic neural networks are certainly much messier and don't seem to have defined layers.
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There are other arrangements of neural nets for various purposes. But regular layers make better use of hardware-supported linear algebra operations to calculate entire layers in parallel.
 
Aineko said:
Avoiding those compatibility problems by sticking to core architecture and OS functionality rather than doing anything that requires directly touching peripherals is decidedly possible, but isn't particularly exciting nor is it likely to benefit from writing in binary.
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The more you explain the more I think it wasn't binary, but I instead I equated simplest(?) language that's super complex and time consuming to code directly to binary instead of anything else, I think a term that was used is "telling the processor directly what to do" but it's been a fascinating conversation anyway
 
GeekGod_of_Speed said:
The more you explain the more I think it wasn't binary, but I instead I equated simplest(?) language that's super complex and time consuming to code directly to binary instead of anything else, I think a term that was used is "telling the processor directly what to do" but it's been a fascinating conversation anyway
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Honestly it sounds to me like the article you read was very likely not accurate. It's not unheard of.
 
Aineko said:
Honestly it sounds to me like the article you read was very likely not accurate. It's not unheard of.
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At a guess based on GeekGod's recollections, the incompatibility referenced in the original source might have been from incompatible instruction sets before x86 became more or less standard for PCs. IIRC there used to be a bunch of major and minor competing ones other than x86 and ARM. Converting a program written for one in a low level language that's not hardware agnostic to another would have been a major endeavor.

Or maybe I'm wrong, that's possible.
 
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TaliesinSkye said:
At a guess based on GeekGod's recollections, the incompatibility referenced in the original source might have been from incompatible instruction sets before x86 became more or less standard for PCs. IIRC there used to be a bunch of major and minor competing ones other than x86 and ARM. Converting a program written for one in a low level language that's not hardware agnostic to another would have been a major endeavor.

Or maybe I'm wrong, that's possible.
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The trouble is, that wouldn't create a positive relationship between compatibility and "telling the processor directly what to do". Writing in assembler (or raw binary, though that's a big 'why even') means you'd have to basically rewrite the whole thing, a major endeavor indeed.
 
Aineko said:
The trouble is, that wouldn't create a positive relationship between compatibility and "telling the processor directly what to do". Writing in assembler (or raw binary, though that's a big 'why even') means you'd have to basically rewrite the whole thing, a major endeavor indeed.
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Oh, if he was implying improved compatibility that doesn't make sense, yeah.
 
David DeLaney said:
Assembly, perhaps. Readable, with difficulty, by the unaided eye, but one tiny step above pure binary source-code dumps.

Dave, looking back on what computing was like when _I_ was in college in the '80s. ...don't ask about APL
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Assembly! That rings a bell, and is probably what I was talking about, thanks for that.
I'm glad somebody knew what I was talking about even if I didn't, most of my facts are still wrong but it's nice to have a name for what I was talking about

Take some internet points
 
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You didn't fool me author, I noticed MC didn't have a name!
Strange that you didn't write anything about muscle memory when she picked up martial arts, considering your knowledge of biology.
MC started off smart with inconspicous technology, but then made some not so smart calls. She should've taken care of personal safety much sooner when she noticed she's a comic book trouble magnet.
You mentioned she had military augment for her real body, but is she upgraded or not?
 
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ZhaWarudo said:
You didn't fool me author, I noticed MC didn't have a name!
Strange that you didn't write anything about muscle memory when she picked up martial arts, considering your knowledge of biology.
MC started off smart with inconspicous technology, but then made some not so smart calls. She should've taken care of personal safety much sooner when she noticed she's a comic book trouble magnet.
You mentioned she had military augment for her real body, but is she upgraded or not?
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The neural lace has military augments in the form of a mode that can subjectively slow down time, but that's just the neural lace. It's not a whole body implant or anything, it only exists in the brain.
 
Ah yes, I thought it also had genetic mods. What is she waiting for, transhumanism FTW!
What about muscle memory, she is not virtual like Neo when he learned kung fu. 47 billion year old humanity would've probably figured out how to include that too in martial arts transfer, but you didn't mention anything beyond brain changes.
Also, like in Stargate, wouldn't so much knowledge be beyond a regular human brain?
 
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ZhaWarudo said:
Ah yes, I thought it also had genetic mods. What is she waiting for, transhumanism FTW!
What about muscle memory, she is not virtual like Neo when he learned kung fu. 47 billion year old humanity would've probably figured out how to include that too in martial arts transfer, but you didn't mention anything beyond brain changes.
Also, like in Stargate, wouldn't so much knowledge be beyond a regular human brain?
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Muscle memory is also stored in the brain, I think it's referred to as kinaesthetic memory or something, the biggest issue with the download of martial arts would be the lack of actual flexibility and slow-twitch and fast-twitch muscles to maintain it without damage, but at a certain point the knowledge probably taught her how to fight with her current bodies terrible shape

Also brain storage space is handwaved in this fic by the implant, it allows more brain storage via the lattice, when she triggers her combat boosters early she has to actually regrow part of her brain and the implant was emulating parts of her consciousness so it's part of the story
 
GeekGod_of_Speed said:
Muscle memory is also stored in the brain, I think it's referred to as kinaesthetic memory or something, the biggest issue with the download of martial arts would be the lack of actual flexibility and slow-twitch and fast-twitch muscles to maintain it without damage, but at a certain point the knowledge probably taught her how to fight with her current bodies terrible shape

Also brain storage space is handwaved in this fic by the implant, it allows more brain storage via the lattice, when she triggers her combat boosters early she has to actually regrow part of her brain and the implant was emulating parts of her consciousness so it's part of the story
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Muscle memory might be brain and spinal cord. Interesting trivia, I know there are some instinctive reflexes that can trigger movement before the signal even reaches the brain. Jerking away from a sharp pain and jumping backwards when something rustles at your feet are two of them. When I was young I had a grass snake set off that jumping back reflex and boy was that memorable. Completely involuntary, you're moving before you realize what's going on. I'm sure those reflexes evolved because speed was essential to survival and going to the brain might take too long.

I believe it's also possible to train out instinctive reflexes if you work at it enough. I lost the instinct to blink when something comes flying at my eye by accident because I fence. Blade tips flying at your face are a common thing. After a while you get used to the idea that the mask will catch them so it's nothing to worry about and you stop flinching and blinking. This was almost very bad on one occasion when I was mowing the lawn and I mindlessly failed to get out of the way of a low branch to the face because part of me was expecting a mask to catch it, except I wasn't wearing a mask. Oops. Fortunately I still have both eyes.
 
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TaliesinSkye said:
Muscle memory might be brain and spinal cord.
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Muscle memory and reflexes are 100% spinal cord, brain doesn't ever enter the equation. (Technically the spine is an extension of the brain.) That's why such actions happen so much faster and without any conscious thought compared to 'normal' actions.

TaliesinSkye said:
I believe it's also possible to train out instinctive reflexes if you work at it enough.
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It is, yes.
 
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Neruz said:
Muscle memory and reflexes are 100% spinal cord, brain doesn't ever enter the equation. That's why such reactions happen so much faster and without any conscious thought compared to 'normal' actions.
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That's interesting to know. I've often wondered how the process of forming those reflexes works. Is it just running a movement through the spinal cord often enough, or does the brain get involved somehow?

Fencing after the first year or two is a surreal experience because so much of what you're doing is reflex. Your brain kind of has a general strategy and can make voluntary motions, but there's this constant undercurrent of things like catching a thrust with a parry that's drilled deep in muscle memory and then following it up with a thrust into the opening and then all of a sudden you've won the point. It's a weird sort of faith you develop, when you get into a bout and you have to trust yourself that when a blade comes flying at you your body will know what to do. Kind of zen, in a way. Sometimes you're at your absolute best in a fight when you're not really having any thoughts at all.
 
TaliesinSkye said:
That's interesting to know. I've often wondered how the process of forming those reflexes works. Is it just running a movement through the spinal cord often enough, or does the brain get involved somehow?

Fencing after the first year or two is a surreal experience because so much of what you're doing is reflex. Your brain kind of has a general strategy and can make voluntary motions, but there's this constant undercurrent of things like catching a thrust with a parry that's drilled deep in muscle memory and then following it up with a thrust into the opening and then all of a sudden you've won the point. It's a weird sort of faith you develop, when you get into a bout and you have to trust yourself that when a blade comes flying at you your body will know what to do. Kind of zen, in a way. Sometimes you're at your absolute best in a fight when you're not really having any thoughts at all.
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It appears to be simple repetition; repeat an action often enough and it ends up getting stored in the spine for 'quick reference' so to speak.

This is one of the reasons why basic training for soldiers is the way it is; the military effectively exploits this particular behavior in order to condition soldier's reflex actions for combat. As you noted, fencing and indeed all forms of combat is mostly reflex, purely because you simply do not have enough time to think about things in an active battle: You either act now or you get dead. (Or lose, if it's sport.)
 
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Its also obviously something footballers deal with, given they frequently see an object travelling towards their head at high speed and don't think "duck!"
 
You'll jerk your hand away from hot stuff even before consciously registering the burn. Ain't nobody got time to wait for the pain signal to make its way to the brain, that shit's hot yo.
 
Nnael said:
You'll jerk your hand away from hot stuff even before consciously registering the burn. Ain't nobody got time to wait for the pain signal to make its way to the brain, that shit's hot yo.
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Not as absolute as that, unfortunately. I spent a lot of my childhood getting burns on my fingers because I was a curious little shit and pain took at least half a second to register.

Some studies show that conscious brain signals seem to override some reflexive reactions for whatever reason. I mean, the reason is probably explained, but it's been a long while since I looked it up. Terrible design, 2/10.
 
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