One Last One for '14

The year-end wrap-up episode of Fo Time – the other ham radio podcast, here.  If you don't know what this is all about and don't want to spend much time finding out but are the least tad curious, this 45 minute wrap-up is the one to listen to.

I swear, it's like the guy's a normal, upbeat person or something.

I really did intend to knock out a couple more posts between the that last year-end post and the actual end of the year, but work and stuff got in the way.  Ah well, have a good evening.

Year-End Roundup

If the Sea Coast Echo and Messy Nessy do it, I guess I'll have to put together a year-end "best of" list now.  Going through each month's posts, here's the one I'd pick as "best."  Though I have to admit, several months weren't all that great while other months had several good ones.  In monthly order:
Battle of the Johnsons
Battle of the Four Ryes
I Want My Blues!
Opening of The Shop
Antique Shop Find
Father's Day
Best Theremin Video on the Net
Movie Review: Pickup on South Street
Don't Let This Happen to Your River
Wild Horses at the Trails Today
Return of the "Russian Woodpecker"?
A New Take on the Fermi Paradox

OK, that's the review for the year.  Will return with more creative stuff later.  Maybe tomorrow.

Top 10 stories from The Sea Coast Echo

Hmmm, it is getting down to the end of the year.  Here's the link.

Merry Christmas!

Here, have a Christmas Comet:

NASA apod permalink  The natural green color is explained there.

Not a lot to say, we've got one clear day of blue-sky weather for Christmas so it's back to the festivities.  Merry Christmas!

Sleep Monster

I don't know if it's the Depths of Winter, healing shoulder, or something else, but I've been sleeping eight plus hours a night.  That's unusual for me, a six-hour man if there ever was one.  Ah well, anyway, here's something better than decaf coffee for those late-night cups:

It doesn't have that weird decaf taste because it never was caffeinated to begin with.  It's more of an "herbal coffee" thing.  Mix in some warmed half-and-half, pretend it's a late evening down at Cafe du Monde, and it's goodnight sleep tight.  BTW, it it's not available locally, you can get it straight from the manufacturer here or from an online specialty grocer here.

Winter Solstice Already?

Yeah, I guess so.  No wonder I slept so late this morning.

photo credit: NASA APOD

Well Merry WhateverFloatsYourBoat!

A new take on the Fermi Paradox

Simply stated: The universe is largely populated by super-intelligent AI robots, and we're too stupid and boring to to have a meaningful conversation.

Here's the popularized article.
Here's the original academic article.

To be fair about the content of these two articles, it doesn't directly tackle the Fermi Paradox but rather is a speculative try at describing what kind of alien beings we may encounter in the coming decades.  The answer to the Paradox just kind of falls out of it. 

I'm not sure I'm on board with this idea of a universe full of SAI, but it is intriguing.  More to the point though, here's my question: can AI observation cause a collapse of mixed quantum states into a single, sensible result?  That is, what happens if you make an AI, however advanced, the observer in a Schrodinger's Cat experiment?  I suspect that the answer is no, that it's just the old Chinese Room scenario, and that the observation stack is merely pushed up one level.

Maybe that's why these hypothetical SAI robots keep us around: we keep reality happening.  (Remember folks, you heard it here first!)

This post wouldn't be complete without a link to the Wikipedia article on Fermi's Paradox, so there it is.  Also, it seems like a good time point to the now classic sci-fi story They're Made Out of Meat.