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Cosmos Will Get a Sequel

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Re: Cosmos Will Get a Sequel

#31

Post by rbanffy »

geoffry wrote: post #27
rbanffy wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> but unfortunately that isn't possible. You know information is never truly destroyed. Bringing Dr. Sagan back will probably remain too difficult for a couple generations, but, eventually, we'll figure that one out. And I can imagine the look on his face.

Even if you collected all the atoms that made up a person's brain, the most important information is lost. For starters, how would you know how those atoms were configured?

That's the information part. I really don't need his own atoms, just the precise pattern they were arranged on a given moment in time. Unless we can find differences between individual atoms of a given isotope, any atom of the right kind will do. Or, if we want to reconstruct just a digital model, we can forgo the atoms and run the simulation on the state representation.

But, like I said, it's a problem to be solved by our smarter successors, not for us.

Re: Cosmos Will Get a Sequel

#32

Post by sorbus »

geoffry wrote: post #27
rbanffy wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> but unfortunately that isn't possible. You know information is never truly destroyed. Bringing Dr. Sagan back will probably remain too difficult for a couple generations, but, eventually, we'll figure that one out. And I can imagine the look on his face.

Even if you collected all the atoms that made up a person's brain, the most important information is lost. For starters, how would you know how those atoms were configured?

Given sufficiently god-like technology, you could run a simulation of the entire world repeatedly, modifying variables until you get a world with a copy of Sagan who fits exactly all the historical information available with him. Something like this is implied to be happening towards the end of Stross's Accelerando, which I highly recommend (there's a free ebook edition).

However, note my use of the term "god-like". Anything capable of doing this is so close to being a god that it makes very little difference from our point of view. There's also the theory that our universe is a simulation run by such an entity - the argument is something like "if it is possible to run a simulation of the universe, it is statistically far more likely that we're in such a simulation." Sort of makes sense, if you have the right mind-set or tilt your head and squint.

Re: Cosmos Will Get a Sequel

#33

Post by doctoboggan »

Carl Sagan tried to recruit Tyson to Cornell for undergraduate studies after he read his application essay. (He decided to go to Harvard though.)

So if he is good enough for Sagan, he is good enough for me.

Re: Cosmos Will Get a Sequel

#34

Post by rbanffy »

Alex3917 wrote: post #30
rbanffy wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think Sagan's love for the audience could be the byproduct of the chemicals he used. There are people who are born musicians or engineers (like me). He was born a teacher. I watched Cosmos on my teens, late at night (actually, past midnight on Fridays, which made my early Saturday classes painful, but that's another story) on a TV station not particularly known for their love of science or reality. A couple p…

>I don't think Sagan's love for the audience could be the byproduct of the chemicals he used. Here are Sagan's own words about how cannabis use has increased his own love and empathy for others: "The cannabis experience has greatly improved my appreciation for art, a subject which I had never much appreciated before. The understanding of the intent of the artist which I can achieve when high sometimes carries over to…

Well... I guess he was a born teacher and cannabis helped a lot.

Re: Cosmos Will Get a Sequel

#35

Post by sliverstorm »

geoffry wrote: post #27
rbanffy wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> but unfortunately that isn't possible. You know information is never truly destroyed. Bringing Dr. Sagan back will probably remain too difficult for a couple generations, but, eventually, we'll figure that one out. And I can imagine the look on his face.

Even if you collected all the atoms that made up a person's brain, the most important information is lost. For starters, how would you know how those atoms were configured?

You don't need to recreate his brain. Collect all the recordings of his voice and photos of his body. Model his body, particularly his chest, throat, and head, until you can accurately reproduce his voice. Then model his speech pattern based on the recordings of his speech, and all you've got left is to hire a few good writers and scientists to write the script.

Re: Cosmos Will Get a Sequel

#37

Post by klbarry »

Alex3917 wrote: post #30
rbanffy wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think Sagan's love for the audience could be the byproduct of the chemicals he used. There are people who are born musicians or engineers (like me). He was born a teacher. I watched Cosmos on my teens, late at night (actually, past midnight on Fridays, which made my early Saturday classes painful, but that's another story) on a TV station not particularly known for their love of science or reality. A couple p…

>I don't think Sagan's love for the audience could be the byproduct of the chemicals he used. Here are Sagan's own words about how cannabis use has increased his own love and empathy for others: "The cannabis experience has greatly improved my appreciation for art, a subject which I had never much appreciated before. The understanding of the intent of the artist which I can achieve when high sometimes carries over to…

Interesting. Not that I doubt Sagan's experiences, but I can't say the people I know who smoke cannabis seem any more empathetic than others.

Re: Cosmos Will Get a Sequel

#38

Post by philwelch »

Alex3917 wrote: post #9
frossie wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah, but Neil de Grasse Tyson, fine chap that he is, doesn't have anything like Carl Sagan's charisma.

I'm generally with Seth Godin when he says that the two elements that make a great presentation are respect and love: http://sethgodin.typepad.com/seths_blog/2009/03/the-two-elem... What makes Carl Sagan so good is that he has an extraordinary amount of love for the audience. It's pretty clear that this stems from his use of empathogenic drugs like cannabis. (Or at least, it would be extremely rare for someone to be…

Or at least, it would be extremely rare for someone to be able to project that much love and empathy for others without the use of psychedelics or empathogens, at least in western society.

It's rare with or without drugs, let's be honest. I've known lots of stoners and they didn't seem particularly empathetic.

I don't think Mr. Rogers ever smoked weed, and he's the best example other than Sagan of a TV personality that projected a lot of love and empathy for the audience.

Re: Cosmos Will Get a Sequel

#39

Post by philwelch »

drgath wrote: post #11
bcrescimanno wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm a huge Sagan fan, and while I agree that Tyson doesn't have quite the same charisma, he does have a charisma of his own. The big question I have is, being on a major network owned by a well-known conservative mogul, will the show be able to take the same stance on religion as its original incarnation. Will Tyson be allowed to refer to religion as, "a reassuring fable?" For the sake of the integrity of a successor…

Tyson tweeted out yesterday: "Simple Logic: Worried that FOX viewers don't know, think, or care about science? That's why COSMOS belongs on FOX." It's being written by the same writers (aside from Carl) as the first one, and produced by Seth MacFarlane, someone who doesn't take shit from FOX. Tyson also doesn't seem like a guy who would corrupt his morals, he knows the value of scientific passion. FOX isn't Fox News,…

FOX isn't Fox News, so don't worry too much. I'm not, at least.

What people don't realize is that Fox News serves a commercial rather than an ideological agenda. The rest of the news media (especially when Fox News started) has a slightly liberal bias, which means the big business opportunity for Fox was right-wing news. It's not that they have a political agenda, they're just giving people what they want--news coverage that aligns to their political bias. As the TV viewing population has skewed older, Fox News has pushed even further to the right to match their target market. Likewise, the business opportunity for the Fox network was young adults. (And for The Sun in 1970, the target market was presumably working class British males who wanted to see topless girls in their tabloids.)

Re: Cosmos Will Get a Sequel

#40

Post by philwelch »

rbanffy wrote: post #22
drgath wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Disagree. Neil is an amazing speaker and educator on science. I'd say the best since Carl Sagan. Like Carl, I'd be willing to sit down and listen to him talk about anything he wanted, for hours and hours, with the same sense of wonder and inspiration. If Carl was a poet, Neil is an orator. Here's a great example. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RQhNZENMG1o Sure I'd love to have Carl back to do Cosmos II as well, but u…

> but unfortunately that isn't possible. You know information is never truly destroyed. Bringing Dr. Sagan back will probably remain too difficult for a couple generations, but, eventually, we'll figure that one out. And I can imagine the look on his face.

You know information is never truly destroyed.

Information is always destroyed, and the universe uniformly has less net information now than it did a second ago; that's the second law of thermodynamics.

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