Why things might have taken so long • Hacker News Board

Re: Why things might have taken so long

#191

Post by Too » Sun, Jan 07, 2018, 8:59 AM UTC

autokad wrote: post #101

coldtea wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> This is not the case, the famous (if apocryphal) quote of "everything that can be invented has been invented" made in 1900 by the head of the US patent office was clearly wrong and made either in jest or due to an enormous lack of imagination. The point is that there is always more to invent and the possibilities keep increasing. Just because somebody said something that was wrong 100 years ago, doesn't mean it's a…

are you calling inventing flight low hanging fruit? I'd bet even after given the answer and reading up on wikipedia, you would struggle building a plain from scratch. its not harder to invent things, you just dont know how to do it. its not a problem on you, I couldnt invent anything myself. if anything, we are in a golden age, much like people ~1900 were when it comes to invention. the scripting languages, algorithm…

Flying is low hanging fruit, i can explain the core concepts of how it works to a 8-year old child with a paper airplane in 10 minutes. Execution is still tricky but you know that it can eventually be done with enough effort, material and machinery. AI or crypto-currencies though, is har to explain even on a high level to my computer science educated friends.

I think the final chapter, Orders of Inovation, in the original post is on the right track. Today there are less of the first order inventions but there will be more and more of the third order inventions that build upon existing inventions.

Re: Why things might have taken so long

#192

Post by sametmax » Sun, Jan 07, 2018, 12:59 PM UTC

nradov wrote: post #189

fastball wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Making your own rope is easy with some trial and error. You just take a bunch of stringy things and twist them together to make a stronger stringy thing. The twisting bit takes some finesse, and obviously you won't be making nylon rope with your bare hands, but making a grass rope is child's play. Making a wheel, once you have the concept of a wheel, is pretty damn easy too. If you want a stone wheel, take a large st…

You can't make a useful wheel out of a single large block of wood. It will dry out and crack. Wooden wheels are made of several pieces to minimize this problem.

You are describing a more complex wheel already.

The first used wheel bas probably some vague round stone with a hole it it.

It sucked, but it was better than no wheel.

Re: Why things might have taken so long

#193

Post by pkalinowski » Sun, Jan 07, 2018, 2:34 PM UTC

Ten years of blockchain technology and the only popular use case is cryptocurrency.

It would seem that current times bring innovation in ridiculous pace, but the fact is - it's still awfuly slow.

Re: Why things might have taken so long

#194

Post by parrellel » Mon, Jan 08, 2018, 3:22 PM UTC

jtolmar wrote: post #15

parrellel wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

True AI as in a true artificial thinking being? Or true AI as effectively a god? All comments like this assume the AI is absolutely goal oriented toward self-improvement and self-propagation and has no limitations or competition. "No biology or society" - what about the physical hardware and infrastructure needed to maintain it? "Self upkeep" - so its directly connected to an entire automated vertically integrated su…

> an AI actor totally dedicated with either the infinite and immediate improvement or replacement of itself makes no sense to me. If I decide that a problem is so hard that the best solution is to invent a superhuman AI to solve it, then this is an approach that human-level intelligence can come up with, so a superhuman intelligence can too. Self-improvement and self-replacement are probably not an AI's actual goal,…

...and the meat-space limitations? Which were the bulk of my point?