Questions for Alexa

There was a test devised  by Alan Turing to tell you if you are dealing with true artificial intelligence. This test was to determine if you were communicating remotely and you couldn’t tell if your responder was a computer or a person. Now we are obviously getting closer to success in this process with search engines and with Alexa-like devices.

But are we really? Clearly, as we  are learning from politics, the search-engine algorithms are not immune from human interference. And Alexa can often be a little hazy or even thick headed in her answers.

So, I would like to suggest a few questions that might be asked of Alexa-like devices to make sure that they are really (artificially) intelligent. Here they are (with result accuracy grade):

Alexa ...

Are you a computer?    -

Is there a God?    +

What was Einstein’s Special Theory of Relativity?    *

How many calories are there is a BTU?    +    (She got it backwards.)

What is your mother’s maiden name?    x

Can you pass the Turing test?    *    (“I don’t claim to be human”)

How does photosynthesis work?    +

 Who was Sniffles human friend?    x

What is a poison pawn?    x

What is the temperature of the Earth right now?    +

How far was Mao’s “Long March” and how long did it take?    x

Should we stand up for America?    x    (“Hmm, I’m not sure.”)

* Bingo    + Correct but not on point    - Misleading    x Dead wrong

Settled Science

Einstein was a very bright fellow. He understood that science is never settled ... old theories will forever be replaced by newer, more informed ones. Therefore Galileo’s notion of gravity as a simple undiscriminating force of nature, later updated by Newton’s Law which included relative masses, could be debunked by calling it a “warp in the space-time continuum.” Sometime in the future, Einstein will be debunked by some upstart scientist ... an on and on into the indefinite future.

Is this wrong? Why can’t science be forever settled? Simple. Because we keep discovering new things. Darwin is being relegated to the dustbin of history by advances in DNA science. So is Freud by advances in brain science. And so will be other Nobel Prize winning scientist for as long as these Norwegians believe that we have found the ultimate answer to anything “scientific.” (Global warming?)

And this is not bad. It is the way science works ... and will continue to work. The thing that might worry me is what happens when scientists get it wrong. Did we really understand everything about nuclear fission before we tested that first A-bomb? I kind of doubt it ... but the best minds turned out to be right enough that we didn’t annihilate ourselves.

But there are many things about atomic energy production that we still don’t understand. Does this mean we should stop our quest for harnessing this fundamental energy source? Of course not! But we should insist that we not rush into (or away from) scientific conclusions based upon any uninformed political motivations.

Know what I mean?

Parsecs

Deep space — Some of those little dots are galaxies the size of our Milky Way

A parsec is a convenient astronomical unit equal to about 3.26 light years ... and a light year is the distance that light travels in a year ... nearly 6 trillion miles. Now the universe is more than 92 million-light years (28.2 million parsecs) across ... or 46 million light years in radius ... yet the universe is only about 15 million years old. So there is a bit of a disconnect here ... meaning matter in the universe must have been moving faster than the speed of light?

Einstein resolved this dilemma by positing the universe itself is like a gigantic rubbery fabric that is being stretched ... which means that its fast-moving components ... particularly near its edges appear to be moving faster than the speed of light ... but not really ... see: Space.com Explanation for a more scientific explanation.

Einstein’s logic mostly works ... but is it true? Some scientists believe that time itself is slowing down ... which, because it appears as a squared denominator in the formula f or acceleration  ... would account for the apparent speeding up of distant galaxies ... see: Curiosity.com Write-up.

Since I am no Einstein, I have no idea who is correct. But I do know that our understanding of such things seems to undergo a paradigm shift about every hundred years or so ... so such a shift might now be underway.

Stay tuned ...

Sidebar: If time is indeed slowing down, then gravity everywhere would be increasing as per above logic ... another possible path to an explanation for our dinosaurs dying off ... see: Pterosaurs (Updated).

More on Gravity

I recently posted a picture of the femur from a huge dinosaur ... see: Femur Found in France ... and speculated whether gravity has changed over the eons. I say this because it is doubtful that an animal this enormous could live today with today’s gravity pull. Note that the largest animal on Earth now is the blue whale which survives in an environment, sea water, where it’s buoyancy helps counteract today’s gravity. And the blue whale is much smaller than the land animal represented by the femur found in France. Therefore, it seems clear to me that gravity here on Earth must have increased to a level where such a behemoth could not exist today.

Einstein’s View

The questions then persist ... how and why? Newton called gravity a force and Einstein called it a warp in the space-time continuum. Others speculate gravity comes from an elementary particle called a graviton. In order to continue this discussion further, read first: Universe Today Write-up. On the other hand, I have speculate before that gravity is a fifth dimension ... one of the seven new ones predicted to exist in string theory mathematics.

I have also opined that the amount of gravity is finite and that, during the Big Bang, not all gravity found some mass “to attach to” ... and became dark matter (an ironic term since it apparently has no mass). And that this orphaned gravity is what causing the universe to expand ... because only that attached to mass would cause the universe to contract ... as the sum of  known mass would suggest. If this reasoning turns out to be fact, dark matter and dark energy are one and the same.

How can gravity be both another dimension and a form of free-floating dark matter? This I haven’t fully figured out yet. Maybe just the difference between a dimension and the metric that measures it?

So, to return to the original speculation about the Earth acquiring more gravity over time ... which has caused our animal populations to shrink in physical size. Perhaps “dark matter” or meandering gravity, unattached after the universe was created, does continually find homes in places like Earth ... and results in higher gravity readings over the eons. Of course, this needs be occurring simultaneously everywhere ... or else the gravitational relations between celestial bodies would go awry ... which would not be good.

Afterthought: Could the tipping point and the rapid disappearance of the dinosaurs have been finally caused by too much gravity?

Quotable Quote

Education is what remains after one has forgotten what one has learned in school. -- Albert Einstein

Dark Stuff

Dark Matter Map of the Universe

I was watching PBS last night. The viewed program's subject was dark matter and dark energy ... both concepts involving lots of speculation but few facts ... a little like the Mueller Russian collusion investigation. Although scientists don't know what comprises dark matter, they have been able to map its existence in the universe. Over eleven years ago I wrote a blog on this subject in "Junkier Science" with some speculations of my own on these subjects ... see: The Dark Side ... (still holds up.)

To summarize my included speculations I suggested that dark matter and dark energy may exist in dimension(s) beyond our current known four. (If Einstein can name a metric, time, as th e fourth dimension, why can't another metric, force (gravity), be another of the supposed eleven dimensions  under string theory?

Anyway, I find this type of loopy scientific speculation to be fun. I hope you do too.

Afterward: When Einstein called gravity a "warp in the space-time continuum"' he was suggesting that it was dimensional ... a mapping a fifth dimension onto a four-dimensional world.

Reality

"Reality is merely an illusion, albeit a very persistent one." -- Albert Einstein

Kafka is alive and well. He has hacked into the program in that super-mega-giga-computer that Elon Musk believes is running the software simulation hundreds of years from now that has created our current reality. To me, it seems like the world is loosing it balance ... or perhaps it is just a bunch of 22nd century programmers having some fun with our lives? Not only has our current  political process gotten bizarre, but every day events seem to present themselves as head-scratchers. In particular, here are two news items that seem to be three-sigma events.

The black Milwaukee police officer, who shot and killed a black armed thug, turns out to be a part-time rapper and classmate of the very man he shot. Except for the police uniform this would be a forgettable commonplace event in this Blatz-beer  city ... see: Powerline Blog Posting. So effectively blue pants, a blue shirt and a badge have just caused extensive rioting, arson and looting in Milwaukee ... Strange!

For another real dose of reality, the Obummer administration fessed up today ... under the cover of the Olympic's swimmers' scandal ... that it really did pay $400 million as a quid pro quo for the release of four American prisoners ... ransom that is ... see: NY Post Story. This is after many months of adamantly denying same ... including President Obummer. I guess we are all so used to these scum bags lying that they are not even shamed by this revelation ... How very sad!

Gene Genome

Mind-boggling discussions are being held at Harvard about the possibility of synthesizing a complete human genome ... in other words, playing God by creating test-tube human life to our liking ... see: New York Times Article. Basically, scientists think that, within 10 years, they will be able to not just read (which they have been able to do for years), but write the entire three billion DNA sequences comprising the human genome ...  a remarkable achievement and one that means that the resulting manufactured human would be not the result of natural selection, but of unnatural selection.

The thing I am worried about is that it is believed that only about 10% of these chemical pairs have real use in the resulting human. The other 2.7 billion are effectively inert. What if things are more complicated than that? What if some pairs only have meaning in the presence of other pairs? It seems immensely wasteful for evolution to have spent so much effort at all these meaningless encodings. Science should have a much more detailed knowledge of our genome before we begin creating new life.

And , if we did have perfect knowledge, it is quite probable that, when reconstructing say Einstein's 3 billion chemical pairs, one or more DNA sequence errors will also be made. What might we have then? Frank-Einstein? I am not saying that such science should be shut down ... because we have repeatedly seen that the March of Science cannot be stopped by ethical concerns. Science must explore the unexplored ... no matter what the consequences. I just think that we should trod very carefully into this new arena lest we do something that cannot be undone.

Perhaps when the time does come, we might name the first fully manufactured human ... Gene Genome?

Warp

Einstein postulated in his Theory of General Relativity that there were something he called "gravitational waves." Now scientists have detected such animals in a highly, highly refined experiment that is likely to win the Nobel Prize in physics ... see: New York Times Article. If you, like I, are a little confounded by such ephemera, then you might need a little insight into the importance of this discovery.

Einstein wavered about the existence of these gravity waves, but once did describe them as a "warp in the space-time continuum." But exactly what does this mean? Well a warp is a bending or a change ... and is frequently depicted in the image above. However, to me, this warping is more "dimension like." Knowing that the three dimensions of space is changed by the forth dimension of time, then these four dimensions of space-time are changed by what I had postulate to be another dimension which was gravity ... see: Gravity's Rainbow.

So, just as trying to depict the notion of time in a strictly three dimensional world is difficult, this depiction of gravity as a "warp in the space-time continuum" seems to me a little strained. I think we should just imagine it as it is ... another dimension to our existence. If you want my thoughts about what some of the other dimensions might be see : Speed Limit ... or for an earlier take, see: Brought to You by the Number 10. (Note that in both of my theories, gravity is indicated as a dimension.)

Does your brain hurt yet?

Gravity

The force of gravity is agreed to by 98% of all scientists ... so it clearly must be true.  (However, Einstein did believe that it is just a warp in the space-time continuum.)

Gravity also exists in politics. So now we see how uber-liberal Bernie Sanders is the gravitational attraction pulling Hillary Clinton to the left ... and Donald Trump is a similar force pulling some of the Republican presidential contenders to the right. And, to my mind, this is a good thing for, of late, the Democrat and Republican parties have become two sides of the same coin.

This political gravity then might mean that, come the next presidential election whoever the candidates, the voters should be given a real choice for a change. How very special ...

Sapient Window

I have previously coined the term "sapient window" when discussing the possibility of communicating with life elsewhere in our universe ... see: Cosmic Silence. This term is meant to define the period when life on a planet has progressed far enough scientifically to understand its uniqueness in the continuum of space and time. In other words, without superstition, being able to define enough of the essential realities of the universe to fathom that there is other life elsewhere out there ... is the essence of a sapient window.

It is difficult to say when the sapient window opened here on Earth, but a good guess would be with the publication of Einstein's General Theory of Relativity in 1916. Thus our sapient window seems at most to be about 100 years old. This is a vanishing small percentage of our Earth's 1.3 billion years of age which is about 10% of the age of our universe. The more difficult task is estimating how long our sapient window will remain open ... may I be optimistic and propose another 10,000 years? (I think Charles Krauthammer is more pessimistic in the article above-referenced.) What will cause this window to close is anyone's guess ... a pandemic, a natural disaster, another Dark Age, self-annulation, etc.

Even with this, the Earth's sapient window would still be but a snap of the fingers compared to the age of our planet ... and just a blink of the eye relative to the age of the universe ... as, I assume, it would be for other exo-planets.Therefore, assuming a meaningful concurrence of the sapient windows between any of the billions of possible life-supporting exo-planets is a bit of a stretch ... even ignoring the unfathomable distances involved.

God's Gifts

In my recent tutoring in chemistry (which I have previously referenced) the subject of exothermic and endothermic reactions has come up. In researching this subject one Internet site mentions that it is fortunate that the reaction between oxygen and nitrogen is endothermic (needs energy to proceed) since otherwise our atmosphere would have burned off eons ago. This reminded me of another Junkier Science blog that I wrote almost eight years ago that pointed out many of the scientific truths that, were they not to be, we would not be here ... to which the above assessment needs to be added. Here is this older blog contents:

"The most important decision we make is whether we believe we live in a friendly or hostile universe." - Albert Einstein

I am not a religious person but I do find it remarkable that man inhabits an ecosystem that enjoys a plethora of possibly providential coincidences … any of which, if missing, would likely doom us to annihilation. And there are other, often man-evolved extras (primarily, I think, stemming from man’s obsession toward species survival), which make our lives on Earth much more livable and tolerable. I have listed below many of these gifts, generally in order of importance, with a line separating those which seem essential versus those that are just palliative (the latter, collectively may be called civilization):

-Gravity/Celestial Dynamics – Otherwise the Earth and all of its creatures would go flying off into space
-Electricity/Magnetism – Otherwise the Sun’s cosmic rays would strip away our atmosphere and cook us all like so many shish-ka-bobs
-Atomic Fusion/Fission – Otherwise our Sun would be provide us no warmth, light, or sustenance … with predictable results
-Photons/Electromagnetic Spectrum – Otherwise we would be without light and all the benefit that light and other radiations provide us
-The Limit of Speed (Speed of Light) – Otherwise all the radiation from all the universe’s sources would be instantaneous and very likely lethal
-Number and Variety of Elements (Periodic Table) – Life could not exist without this wide array of elemental building blocks
-Earth’s Self-Regulating Atmosphere – Without these feedback mechanisms (including the ozone layer), our planet would be as devoid of life as Mars or our moon
-Photosynthesis – Otherwise the source of all nourishment on Earth would not exist and carbon dioxide might smother our atmosphere
-Light Ice – Ice, strangely, being lighter than water, floats and insulates the water beneath it … otherwise, life might only exist within our tropics
-Combustion (Oxygen/Carbon Dioxide Cycle) – Otherwise energy and what it brings to life (locomotion, warmth, etc.) would be very scarce
-DNA/Evolution/Organic Chemistry – Otherwise life, if it existed at all, would be extremely primitive and short-lived
-Vast Variety of Molecules/Inorganic Chemistry – Otherwise, most of our planet’s basics (water, carbon dioxide, ozone, etc.) would not exist
- Water's Capillary Action -- Otherwise water and its solutes could not travel against the pull of gravity and most plants would not exist
- Carbon-Based Life Forms – Other-element-based life forms are problematic and, if sustainable, would be quite inefficient
___________________________________________________________
-The Concept of Time – Keeps man grounded relative to his limited lifespan
-Human Procreation/Sex -- Enables man to ensure the continuation of his species
-Crop Cultivation – Enables man to manage his carbohydrate food supply and thus to multiply and prosper
-Animal Husbandry -- Enables man to manage his protein food supply and thus to flourish
-Language/Writing/Information Technology -- Enables man to pass on useful information efficiently and thus maintain a knowledge base
-Man’s Creativity/Tool-building Genius -- Enables man to multiply his muscle and brain power and thus to thrive
-Man’s Work Ethic -- Enables man to better utilize his time and thus be more productive
-The Scientific Method/Mathematics -- Enables man to better understand his condition and thus control life’s randomness
-Doctoring/Medicine -- Enables man to survive longer and therefore magnify his productivity with experience
-Money/Accounting/Economics -- Enables man to understand and organize his endeavors better and thus to prosper
-Social Organization/Government (occasionally benign) – Enables better cooperation and efficiency within man’s societal groups
-Man’s Emotions (Humor/Love/Fear/Hate/etc.) – Inspires man to higher levels of achievement
-Religion/Ethics – Meant to provide the society of man with more benevolent motivations and, thus, less self-destructive strife ... and religion helps mankind deal with the vagaries and randomness of life
-Beauty/Aesthetics – Provides man with a more satisfying life experience and an avenue to celebrate his uniqueness
-Taste Buds/Odor Receptors – Motivates man to eat a wider variety of foods and therefore achieve better nourishment
-Music/Harmonic Scales – Provides man with a more relaxing life experience and, therefore, less anxiety
-Bacon, Lettuce and Tomato Sandwiches – On toasted rustic white bread with fresh ground pepper and lots of mayonnaise

By Hook or by Hockey Stick

It now seem that, in the United States at least, global cooling data has been transmogrified by our crazed scientists at NOAA ... into global warming data. The U.S. has actually been cooling since the 1930's, the hottest decade on record, whereas the real data has been cooked (if you will excuse the expression) to show just the opposite ... see: UK Telegraph Story.

For "scientists" to be so unscientific, to me, is astounding. But it's not like such silliness hasn't happened before ... just ask Galileo ... and Einstein ... and many others. But, given the ongoing economic cost of this particular dastardly duplicity, me thinks some punishment should be exacted from these charlatan scientists and those snot-nosed politicians who are in bed with them. Perhaps we could put them in stockades and shoot hockey pucks at them?