> But if we could build an uninterpretable machine learning model that beats any hand-built traditional ‘physics’ model, would it really be physics?
At that point I wonder if it would be possible to feed that uninterpretable model back into another model that makes sense of it all and outputs sets of equations that humans could understand.
Thanks for releasing, I've been looking for something exactly like this to help plan out my PCT hike. Google Earth Pro for linux has become less usable with each release.
I realize it's allegorical in nature, but one of the conclusions made in the article is
> Reaching the absolute information is individual and simply any human being is able to achieve that.
Is that a reasonable conclusion? I'm curious how this jives with the 'on the shoulders of giants' concept that we've built a lot of our modern knowledge on.
How do you interpret "reaching the absolute information"?
I'm content with reaching the relative information about the bits of the universe that I find most interesting, and hope to add a few good and novel ones during the remainder of my lifetime.
Two areas where a community helps are (a) finding the known ways blazed* and (b) avoiding becoming a crank.
For the former it makes sense that one prefers to make good time. For the latter, finding a new way to get to new fields that may or may not be fertile may or may not be worth doing; finding a new way to get to existing fields that either (a) shaves trip time for those travelling light, or (b) is more easily passable for those travelling with a bunch of baggage, is definitely worth doing.
Tiger got to hunt; bird got to fly; man got to sit and wonder 'why, why, why?' Tiger got to sleep; bird got to land; man got to tell himself he understand.
Cats and wind turbines present dangers to different types of birds, with the turbines being a danger to larger raptors including condors - so I think your comparison is an oversimplification of the issue, even though I'm a proponent of wind power in general.
LOL, I'm reminded of a Futurama episode from over a decade ago where one of the presidential candidates during the debate, when asked "Environment: Yes or No" replied:
Two words: Condor attack. Don't want that. Got to say no.
It feels like "Condor" is a trigger phrase that's been around and programmed into people for years
They were extinct in the wild in the late 80s. There's under 500 in the wild now. Of all the things that might trigger people, I suppose condor extinction is pretty understandable.
I came in to say this exact same thing. I've heard this story so many times over my lifetime, the idea that this is the "future" feels like Tesla's Full Self Driving Robotaxi fleet, just a few years away every year!
It’s not a dead end per se because cockroaches are used as a model organism in neuroscience experiments. They’re just not very useful outside of academic research for the same reason that they’re useful in the lab: their brains are very simple.
I think this application would only work if they were released as a swarm, using basic triangulation of the mesh network to get them to spread out throughout the rubble, exploiting their natural ability to crawl all over the place in great numbers.
"Everyone: remain calm. Our mobile cockroach nest has just arrived and we'll be sending in the swarm, just as soon we can get them geared up and briefed. On the off-chance anyone isn't pinned and can still move their legs, please don't step on them!"
Similar story. Was in a caravan with friends on a road trip and apple maps had us going onto a dirt road to save time. We go overlanding a lot, so dirt roads aren't weird, but we decided to stop and double check before proceeding too far on the road.
About a minute later, a border control agent pulls up next to us and starts with the standard interrogation. Turns out, apple maps had been telling people to use a dirt road to circumvent a border control checkpoint - which according to the officer was a felony. We proceeded back onto the pavement and through the checkpoint where they waved us through. The dirt road wouldn't have been faster at all, so it was puzzling why it was giving those directions.
One possibility that occurs to me is that various people might have reported the border checkpoint to Apple Maps as a blockage in the past, in order to get it to give them a route around it.
Not that this absolves Apple, of course, since they should absolutely be checking these things better.
