TED Talks: Casting spells with DNA

In this TED Talk, Paul Rothemund uses the programing language of life (DNA) to create physcical structures, in this case smily faces, a map of the American Continetns, or a star or triangle. This use of programing language is compared to the binary system, and other forms of formating. This makes me think of html formatting, and how words and tags combine to form something completly new and hardly resembeling the programming language used.

TED Talks: Unveiling the genius of multi-touch interface design

This TED Talk is used to showcase a new form of interaction that can be used for computers. The multi touch screen has very intuitive controls, and a plethora of uses, from the creative to the useful management of data. I wonder what the potential gaming applications are. Either way, Jeff Han amazed with this muilti touch interface tool.

TED Talks: Kenichi Ebina

This TED Talk is less of a talk, and more of an entertaining dance. Ebina blends several styles of dancing as well as martial arts into an interesting and fun style to watch. Slightly robotic, it amuses and astounds to a point.

HTML code

I have only used html code once before, and that was without knowing it. It was the
function, and I copied it from someones myspace post and reused it without knowing what it did.

AI

Artificial intelligence, some spin it as the future boon of all mankind, others label it as the coming doom of all man kind. Imagine the good that an intelligence created by man could be. No more driving yourself, let your car do that. Your computers would be interactive, art creation could be automated, manual labor could be done by machines, international politics could be handled by humanoid ambassadors, warfare and sports could be taken over by robots. Virtually all levels of our current society would be affected. However, we as humans fear what we do not know, or understand. If we give control of our lives to an intelligence that is not our own, and potentially smarter (though can the creation grow beyond the capacity of the creator?) isn’t there a possibility, even the most remote one, of the machines realizing that we humans are the blight of this planet? I don’t want to go off on a Sci-Fi tangent, but with great power comes great responsibility, and if… when AI comes into play as a fully adaptable, and learning computer (or being?), much can and will be relegated to the computers. Let’s just hope they don’t read any Isaac Asimov (I, Robot author).

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Artificial_intelligence gives the definition of the field of AI, the history and the challenges, and the successes (Deep Blue for instance).

TED Talks: Thomas Barnett

Thomas Barnett’s ideas on the military are accurate (and they should be, it’s his job). His statements about our levitation force are on the money, as is the thinking that we lack the follow through force with the training, and expertise to rebuild countries. Dividing the military into two roles: butt whipping and reconstruction sounds good. This will allow soldiers to be soldiers and will not force them to multitask two very different roles. Likewise the reconstruction side will not be forced to break down doors and shoot the bad guys. As for improvements, I can honestly say that my knowledge is completely outclassed in this instance, and I trust his judgment.

TED Talks: Jane Goodall

Jane Goodall is a scientist noted for her study of the great apes, and has been researching this for over 40 years. In her TED talk she speaks about the destruction of habitat, culture and environment. Her first reference to the interconnectivity of these problems involves large international logging corporations that build roads through forests inhabited by natives. These natives then use the road to go from hunter gatherers who only took what they needed, to poachers and vendors of meat. They now kill everything that moves, destroying the food chain and screwing themselves in the long run. They take the meat they get from the clear cutting style of hunting they employ and use the logging trucks to sell it for money in the towns. All the wile the loggers deforest the area, further reducing the productivity of the natives hunting grounds. The loggers move on, leaving the road, and waste behind it, and the navies are left with drastically reduced forestland, and food. She also throws her ape research into her speech, talking about how they have emotions, and intelligence, and that the destruction of the forests also harms our closest cousins, who are also deserving of consideration and empathy.