Homework 11

Computing, Information and the Future #11, due M 11/2

1) Under the heading "Question 1," "1," "Answer 1," or anything like that, discuss briefly the applicability or inapplicability of the discussion from Monday 10/26 to your project.

2) Under the heading "2" or something like that, discuss briefly the applicability or inapplicability of the discussion from Wednesday 10/28 to your project.

3) Advance your project. Under the heading "3," etc., place the new things.

Some robot pics and videos

Robot gardening then...

Credit: Getty Images - "...editorial use intended to report a newsworthy event or illustrate a matter of general interest, for which typically no release is required." http://cache3.asset-cache.net/xc/90007565.jpg?v=1&c=IWSAsset&k=2&d=77BFBA49EF878921CC759DF4EBAC47D0554BA0F1C883642D9B517C563003298BFFCFC41BB7EA6F48.

and now...

http://people.csail.mit.edu/nikolaus/drg/images/stories/Distributed_Robotics_Garden_060.jpg

http://www.technovelgy.com/ct/Science-Fiction-News.asp?NewsNum=2183

Recognize anything about the robots?

Discussion - what do you think??

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u23Hqq8QbeE&feature=player_embedded (World's first controllable MAV monocopter, Robotic Samara (maple seed)); video only http://link.brightcove.com/services/player/bcpid263777539?bctid=46375788001

Flying insectbot? http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dYDR-yC3wK0
That but with other robot video links at: http://actualites.epfl.ch/presseinfo-com?id=936

http://www.technologyreview.com/blog/editors/24303/?a=f (TR article with embedded video of how it was developed/works):

UMD press release(http://www.newsdesk.umd.edu/scitech/release.cfm?ArticleID=2000) embedded gee-whiz video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u23Hqq8QbeE&feature=player_embedded.

Leg lab: http://www.technologyreview.com/blog/editors/24313/?a=f with embedded video; direct from youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bd5iEke6UlE&feature=player_embedded#

Petman: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=67CUudkjEG4&feature=player_embedded; with music track http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Kkztd8s5Kys&NR=1. Which is better?

Big Dog: stable in snow, rocks, clear ice...even when viciously kicked http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cHJJQ0zNNOM

Prediction vs. Intervention; Weather vs. Climate

Let's start with the weather, then go from there to climate

Observation #1:

. . . Does Fall semester feel different from Spring semester?

Observation #2:

. . . My lab was involved in an interesting weather research project

. . . Later, let's discuss if the results apply to climate...

Predicting the Weather

Remember "Spoil Sports of the Prediction Game"?

. . . That's why weather forecasters have a bad reputation

. . . . . . It's not their fault!

. . . . . . They're doing the best they can

. . . They often do okay short term

. . . . . . We'll never predict the weather on this date next year

. . . . . . Delphi method: how far in advance do you think we'll get?

What about weather control?

. . . Keeping the streets open costs a lot!

. . . Like here in the US in, say...

. . . . . . Minneapolis (straight north of Little Rock)

. . . . . . Buffalo (lots of Great Lakes-related snow)

. . . . . . etc.

. . . Little Rock -

. . . . . . Snow equipment costs a bundle, hardly ever needed

. . . . . . Cheaper just to shut down the city

. . . . . . . . . That's expensive too (but at least you get an extra vacation day!)

Moscow has

(a) a lot of snow, &

(b) budget problems

Credit: Igor Tabakov, Moscow Times, 10/15/09, http://www.themoscowtimes.com/business/article/luzhkov-takes-snow-fight-to-the-sky/387446.html

The Russian Air Force plans to spray clouds with liquid nitrogen, silver (iodide?), and cement

. . . see news article link under image above

Interestingly, you can buy weather modification equipment

. . . http://www.nawcinc.com/photos.html

. . . How well it works is another issue...

What's easier, predicting or controlling weather?

. . . What would you guess?

About research from my lab

. . . Experiments done by former grad student Dongping Xu

. . . . . . as-yet unpublished research

We asked:

What predictions are more reliable:

Forecasting the weather?

-or-

Forecasting the effects of weather modifications?

How we answered

1. Predict the weather using MM5 on given initial weather pattern

2. Add a bug to MM5, run it again

. . . what is a bug?

Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:H96566k.jpg, in http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Software_bug

3. Do this for many different bugs

4. Calculate the average amount of change caused by a bug

. . . that is, change to some quantitative weather value

Why care about how MM5 acts when bugs are added?

Now do another experiment

(This is a little more complicated)

1. Run MM5 to predict the weather

1a. Change an initial condition a tiny bit and run it again

1b. Determine the change in the prediction

1c. Calculate sensitivity:

s=change in output / change in input

= change in predicted value / change in initial condition

= Delta output / Delta input
(Delta is a Greek letter that is a triangle)

2. Add a bug to MM5, run it again

3. Do this for many different bugs

4. Calculate the average amount of change (in sensitivity, this time) caused by a bug

So:

First part:

How resistant is weather prediction to software bugs?

Second part:

How resistant is weather intervention prediction to bugs?

Conclusion:

Weather prediction is considerably more bug-resistant than weather intervention prediction

Or

"We can't predict the effects of weather modifications very well, unless we get rid of all bugs, and we already know we can't do that."

This leads to the big remaining question:

. . . Only a few people care about weather modification

. . . A lot of people care about changing global warming

. . . But can we tell how much change is actually needed?

Trend Analysis

Separating the signal from the noise


Consider the graph below

Suppose this graph shows a fact about how bar height changes as we proceed rightward

Suppose further the data are noisy

What do we mean by "noise"?

We want to shrewdly determine the fact by mentally discounting the noise

Without giving any hints to your neighbors...

Take another look, then decide on the mostly likely fact:

a) Height decreases the farther right we go
b) Height starts out at a high plateau on the left, then switches to a low plateau as we move rightward
c) Height decreases at first, then increases ("U" curve) as we move rightward
d) Height increases as we move rightward
e) Cannot tell from the given data

Discussion?






Consider the graph below


Suppose this graph shows a fact about how bar height changes as we proceed rightward

Suppose further the data are noisy

We want to shrewdly determine the fact by mentally discounting the noise

Without giving any hints to your neighbors...

Take another look, then decide on the mostly likely fact:

a) Height decreases the farther right we go
b) Height starts out at a high plateau on the left, then switches to a low plateau as we move rightward
c) Height decreases at first, then increases ("U" curve) as we move rightward
d) Height increases as we move rightward
e) Cannot tell from the given data

Discussion?

Note! Both graphs show the same data

Comments?

Homework 10

IFSC 4399 Computing, Information and the Future (due W 10/28/09)

Suggestion: answer Q1 soon, while things are still relatively fresh in your mind. At least, figure out the answer for writing down later (that's actually better because then you have to think of the answer twice!)

Q1) We discussed in class how there is no such thing as a "scientific proof." Explain in your own words.

Q2) Write a new part for your project of 250 words or more.

Earth 2100 continued

Earth 2100 (an ABC production)

Some initial comments and questions before the general discussion

What is the difference between science and mathematics?







Math: prove new things based on existing knowledge

Mathematical reasoning is deductive

• 1+1=2
• 2+2=4
• Therefore, 1+1+1+1=4 (proof by substitution)

• All men are mortal
• Socrates is a man
• Therefore, Socrates is mortal (proof by "syllogism")

• Deduction can prove things
• Mathematics uses deduction
• Therefore, mathematics can prove things
• . . . . . . (proof by syllogism again!)

Science is different from math!

• Science is based on induction (not deduction)
• All apples observed to break off the tree, fall down
• Therefore, if I shake this apple tree and an apple breaks off, it will fall down
• Not a proof! Can you think of a counterexample?

• That which goes up has always come down
• Therefore, if I throw this up, it will come down
• Not a proof! Can you think of a counterexample?

Science needs more than only induction

Humankind has always sought reasons

Scientists call those reasons "theories" and "hypotheses"

Theories are the big ones

• relativity
• evolution
• continental drift/plate tectonics

Hypotheses are the little ones

• If the ground gets waterlogged, water will get into my basement
• IFSC majors learn more marketable things than physics majors

Conclusion:

Math proves; science does not prove!

Science explains (using theories)

Science predicts (because the theories predict)

The phrase "scientific proof" makes no sense!

• Science does not prove things!
• It explains things and finds evidence
• If only everyone actually knew that
• Like reporters, spokespeople, politicians...

Comments on Earth 2100

. . . Worst case scenario consistent with best science available

. . . The main crises were global warming and deadly disease

. . . . . . So it could happen that bad, but might not

Climate science uses theories
implemented as complex
computerized models

• There are variations among different models
• They make somewhat varying global warming predictions

Almost all (never all, right?) climate specialists agree:

• Global warming is happening, will get worse, and is a serious problem
• That is the consensus among climate scientists
• Just no math-style proof

Politics and special interests are a different ball game

. . . Some economic interests benefit most if nothing is done

. . . . . . Naturally, they will impede change

. . . . . . . . . That is famous economist Adam Smith's "Invisible Hand"

Your turn: Earth 2100 discussion

Please have your say and let everyone else have theirs!
I reserve the right to take an active role in organizing the discussion.

What technologies are envisioned and what are their plausibilities?

• We live in Arkansas, which is in the United States, we are Americans and speak English
• Some people live in Holland - what is the elevation in Holland, what country is it in, what is the nationality of its people, and what language do they speak?

What can we say about its sea wall?

Ever see the doors of the lock of the Big Dam Bridge?

What is the connection between epidemics and global warming?

• Any diseases already spread to the US?
• Any that may soon?

What are some tipping points to social stability?

• Long-term blackouts
• Transportation network breakdown
• Where would you want to live if things went bad?
• How about Arkansas?
• Little Rock?

What can you do now?

Hyperpowers are historically limited in time

• Mongolia
• Rome
• UK
• US

We're #1!

But how to stay that way?









What are the natural tendencies that cause hyperpowers to be time-limited?

• Rigidity
• Over-confidence from past successes
• Inner rot

What can be done to prevent it or delay the inevitable?







Why successful societies collapse

Earth 2100 quotes someone asking what the person who cut down the last palm tree on Easter Island could have been thinking

That is straight out of Diamond's book

Diamond appeared several times in the movie!

Easter Island, Rome, the Anasazi, the Mayans, the Greenland Norse, ...

Homework 9

Due next Wednesday, Oct. 21, 2009.

Recall HW 7, where you assembled information about your project, developed an outline, etc. Let's continue the development process some more.

1) In a new posting on your blog, post your current writeup. Add notes inside it in various places. Each note says what you would like to add in at the location of the note. If you are writing a story, this might not work - instead, just add some more material to it, or develop more plot description, or whatever advance seems best.

2) Write and incorporate a new part. Ideally it should be about crime (or precrime!), or indeed any other idea from Minority Report or our discussion of it. But if that doesn't fit, any other advance to your project will do just as well.

3) Write and incorporate another new part. Ideally it should be about cyborgs, mind hacking, ghosts, shells, ghosts in shells, therm-optic camouflage, or something else related to The Ghost in the Shell. But again, any advance to your project will be fine.

4) Explain briefly what you did for questions 1), 2), and 3) so that I can decipher what you did for this HW.

Homework 8

Two items, one is due on Wednesday before class (only 2 days!)

1) (Due this Wednesday before class) Post, on your blog, 250 words or more commenting on "Minority Report." This will get you thinking so we can have a more in-depth discussion. You can discuss any aspect of it you like - here are a few suggestions to get you started.

• Could this really happen?
• What could really happen?
• What if they found genes that make it more likely for someone to commit a crime - what should they do?
• What is the movie "really" about? For example, Orwell's book Animal Farm was really not about animals, but about communism, and Russia (then the Soviet Union) in particular. You can have a story about cats that's really about dogs, etc.
• What themes found in other movies and stories or in the popular imagination are present?
• What methods and tricks does the movie use to make the audience like it?
• Speaking of precrime - http://www.cnn.com/2009/TECH/10/06/security.screening/index.html. (And what about racial profiling? Any kind of "profiling"? Differential insurance rates? Is a definite future illness a "preexisting condition"? Measure testosterone levels, which predict criminality? Eugenics? Young men commit the most crimes - put'em all away? See http://www3.interscience.wiley.com/journal/119317165/abstract?CRETRY=1&SRETRY=0.)

2) (Due next Monday) Request a slot for presenting your project. Any class between now and the end of the semester is alright, up to two people on a given day. The course index/topic list shows the available class days. Do this by email to berleant@gmail.com.