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A Personal Statement from Iain Banks

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Re: A Personal Statement from Iain Banks

#201

Post by michaelochurch »

altertoad wrote: post #195
michaelochurch wrote: post #178

Earlier quoted context omitted.

More money is not what is needed here--we already pour tons of money into cancer research. What's needed are new ideas. If you really want to fight cancer, skip the startup and go to graduate school. Computational and mathematical approaches to understanding and fighting cancer are still in their infancy. There is a lot of scope for smart, motivated people to do good. There are a zillion[0] talented young programmers…

what do ya mean rigged

If you're on your first VC-funded startup, you'll probably get torn up by liquidation preferences and dilution for executive hires (that you had no say in; they were VC injections) and various other things, and not get very rich. You could end up worse off than an employee (because they get to take real salaries; you're hosed if your equity gets zeroed). You'll have to play a second time (capitalizing on your reputation, having joined Those Who Have Completed An Exit) to get what you came to the game for. It's like the record industry: you make money on your second album, because the record company has leverage to screw you on the first one.

If you're a manager or executive-level hire, you're probably never going to get the investor contact you were promised and, if you do, you probably won't be allowed to say much, so the networking you were promised won't happen.

If you're an engineer, you're probably not going to get the "leadership" (executive) position you were promised. It'll be given to some external asshat when the company goes in to "scaling"/social-climbing mode and starts hiring "real X's" (i.e. not the fools who worked for 90 hours per week and 50% of market salaries, judged not to be good enough for prime time).

Only a tiny percentage of VC-funded startups have a real engineering culture (pre-apocalyptic Google) where you can do well as an engineer without becoming a manager. If that's what you want, your odds are better (not great, but better) at a place like Google.

Most VC-funded startups grow too fast to keep a decent culture, and the executive positions often get handed out by VC to their underachieving friends who couldn't make it on their own.

That's what I mean by "rigged".

Re: A Personal Statement from Iain Banks

#202

Post by gngeal »

bluetshirt wrote: post #190
engtech wrote: post #157

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, more money is needed. 41% of deaths are due to cancer. It really is one of the biggest problems we have as a species and we should spend more effort on it rather than the things we do spend effort on. But I wholeheartedly agree that rather than trying to be a billg and earn money to fund philanthropy, the world needs more researchers.

People are going to die. If it's not cancer, it'll be heart failure. I'm not convinced that what this world needs is research into keeping sick people alive longer. We have lots of people as it is.

"I'm not convinced that what this world needs is research into keeping sick people alive longer."

Given that the average costs of bringing up any single individual are nowadays probably at an all-time high, it makes sense to invest something into keeping those people from dying prematurely.

Also, this is less about keeping sick people alive longer, but about making them unsick, or even prevent them from becoming sick in the first place (prevention, timely diagnosis, study of the immune system behavior and reactions related to the cancer onset).

Re: A Personal Statement from Iain Banks

#203

Post by xradionut »

pavel_lishin wrote: post #156
tjic wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Excellent call-out on Barnes; he's one of the most under-rated authors out there. If you haven't read his stuff, pick it up.

I think the only novel of his I read was Finity, and that kind of turned me off.

Not all of his work is great, but the "Thousand Cultures" series and "Century Next Door" series are the great reads.

Note: The dark anti-hero in "Kaleidoscope Century" is probably the reason he hasn't won many major awards. You can't write such a character and not piss off the various sci-fi author and fandom cliches.

Re: A Personal Statement from Iain Banks

#204

Post by lutze »

DanBC wrote: post #25
podperson wrote: post #21

Iain [M] Banks is the writer whose books I most look forward to reading. Fuck cancer.

A UK charity is taking this approach to fund raising. Compare these two adverts - "Not Alone", MacMillan Cancer Support ( http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MLpS97XA5VA ) "Cancer, We're Coming For You", Race for Life ( http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GWJEmMDQXoA ) Yes, fuck cancer.

I'm not sure if you understand what MacMillan is about, but you're comparing apples and oranges here.

"Fuck Cancer" is all well and good... but MacMillan's work isn't about finding a cure, it's about easing suffering. They provide support and care to patients and their families, "Not Alone" sums them up pretty perfectly.

Re: A Personal Statement from Iain Banks

#205

Post by nawitus »

grego wrote: post #155
nawitus wrote: post #110

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>You might as well argue that nano-bots will be able to reanimate a body that has decomposed, and save money on all the freezing equipment. Perhaps that will be the case if given enough time, but we seem to be a long way away from that technology. No, you might not as well argue that. If you think you can, then please argue how you can retrive information from a completely decomposed brain. On the other hand, it's pr…

If we draw something like an air-field on sand, it is reasonable to believe that the planes will start to land again... Sounds like that "cargo cult" variety of science.

So your argument is that if someone believes something to be reasonable, he is wrong because there exists some other unrelated non-reasonable beliefs?

Re: A Personal Statement from Iain Banks

#206

Post by Cushman »

nova wrote: post #180
reasonattlm wrote: post #36

Another person that might be cryopreserved [1], but probably won't be, much like the 150,000 who passed in the last day or so [2]. Many sorts of terminal case can actually lead to better quality cryopreservation under present legal restrictions [3], in comparison to the drawn out and uncertain end of aging, precisely because they are more rapid and certain in time. (Or might be plastinated [4] in the alternate histor…

I feel you. The deathism of this thread, on a site read by technically-oriented people, where problably many agree with the computational theory of mind really makes me lose hope in the human kind. It's not thinking that cryonics is not worth it. That's a reasonable position. I'm undecided myself. It's that response, that fighting death is somehow unethical or naive. That Death is Good, Part of the Cosmos, Don't You…

Let's talk about the computational theory of mind. Is it bad to turn off a computer? I have a process running that will continue to do productive work forever. Is it bad to suspend it? If I resume it later, is that not bad? If I intend to resume it later, but forget, is that bad again?

There are some things that happened to my physical body that I cannot now, nor never will remember. Is that bad? There are memories I have that my physical body never really experienced. Is it bad that that person never existed? If I forget those, will that be bad?

Suffering is bad. Death is the ultimate destiny of all which was once alive. It is tempting for a brain state looking ahead to its demise to say that one or ten or one hundred years is too few, and if we had one thousand, or one million, or one million million, that would be enough. But I know no reason that should be true.

I look forward and see a descendant of humanity surviving to witness, in itself, the heat death of the universe. As every resource has been expended to maintain its consciousness, while the last holes fill in with entropy, it remembers everything that has ever happened, and it is looking forward with its dying thoughts to an infinity times an infinity as many lifetimes of nothingness which will follow, and I do not want it to weep that it will cease to be. I want it to stride boldly into oblivion, knowing that it has done its best, and with some glimmer of hope and pride for what, in some yet unconceived corner of possibility space, might be.

And I want that peace for every consciousness and form of consciousness, however transient, that experiences itself from now until then, be they animal, vegetable, or mineral.

Of course we should fight aging, with every resource we can muster, because aging is suffering. But we should not hate death, because that too is suffering.

To bring it back around... Iain M. Banks will die, very soon. Many people here are extremely distraught about this, and I am one of them. He has a choice to make, whether to make some attempt to extend his life at some expense to his remaining quality of life. It sounds as if he will choose not to. Many will, in grief, hate him for that choice. They are grieving, and it is natural, but that idea abstracted is selfish and it is evil. Iain Banks will die, and he will be fine. It is we who grieve who deserve peace, and I and others feel that peace is contained in this truth:

Death is okay.

It is not great. We do not love it. We can and will work to destroy it. But we will not succeed, and that is -- that must be -- okay.

Re: A Personal Statement from Iain Banks

#207

Post by michaelochurch »

droithomme wrote: post #200
michaelochurch wrote: post #178

Earlier quoted context omitted.

More money is not what is needed here--we already pour tons of money into cancer research. What's needed are new ideas. If you really want to fight cancer, skip the startup and go to graduate school. Computational and mathematical approaches to understanding and fighting cancer are still in their infancy. There is a lot of scope for smart, motivated people to do good. There are a zillion[0] talented young programmers…

Salaries in the life sciences are no where near where you think they are. Lots of people with biology degrees are making less than theatre majors. Even if you have the more elaborate title of "biochemist", salaries are around $45k, not the $125k you are expecting to earn. http://www1.salary.com/Biochemist-I-Salary.html Starting salaries are around $35k. If you are working for a non-profit foundation (ie: cancer resea…

See, that's my exact point. I didn't say that they make $125k (that's about average for a half-decent VC-istan programmer) because I knew scientific salaries to be low (I'm surprised to hear that they're that low) and they shouldn't be. Those salaries should be at least 3 times higher.

You should make more working on scientific research that helps everyone than you'd make ($100-150k for typical programmers) writing yet another ad exchange.

It's not true that you "can't get good people" with low salaries. The sciences are full of great people making low salaries. You just can't get very many of them. We need good people in the sciences and a much larger number, which means that society needs to start paying scientists what they're actually worth.

Re: A Personal Statement from Iain Banks

#208

Post by adrianhoward »

bluetshirt wrote: post #190
engtech wrote: post #157

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, more money is needed. 41% of deaths are due to cancer. It really is one of the biggest problems we have as a species and we should spend more effort on it rather than the things we do spend effort on. But I wholeheartedly agree that rather than trying to be a billg and earn money to fund philanthropy, the world needs more researchers.

People are going to die. If it's not cancer, it'll be heart failure. I'm not convinced that what this world needs is research into keeping sick people alive longer. We have lots of people as it is.

I'm not convinced that what this world needs is research into keeping sick people alive longer. We have lots of people as it is.

When I was a kid childhood leukemia was a death sentence. These days survival rates are in the 80% and up range.

The goal isn't non-dead sick people. It's well people.

Attacking that problem doesn't mean that you can't attack the problem of too many people too. Hopefully in a more productive way than having a horrible, lingering, painful disease solve it for us.

Re: A Personal Statement from Iain Banks

#209

Post by nawitus »

mryan wrote: post #154
nawitus wrote: post #110

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>You might as well argue that nano-bots will be able to reanimate a body that has decomposed, and save money on all the freezing equipment. Perhaps that will be the case if given enough time, but we seem to be a long way away from that technology. No, you might not as well argue that. If you think you can, then please argue how you can retrive information from a completely decomposed brain. On the other hand, it's pr…

alphaoverlord understands the point I was making. Both of these things are impossible, at the current level of tech. One or both of them might become possible through the use of sufficiently advanced technology. > On the other hand, it's pretty reasonable to assume that a cryopreserved brain preserves a lot of the information in the brain. See, I don't think it's reasonable to assume this. I believe that both of thes…

>I believe that both of these things are equally possible - that is, not very possible at all.

I believe it's incorrect to claim that the probability that a cryopreserved brain has some information about the brain structure is equal the the probability that a fully decomposed brain has after decades of decomposing (which is the scenario I have in mind).

I just don't understand how someone could make such a proposition. If we dig up a decomposed brain, it's just pretty much completely destroyed (e.g. fully decomposed) if we look at it with a microscope. I'm assuming that we're not talking about rare niche cases of fossilization etc.

To have an idea of how much information vitrification preserves, you should know that a kidney can be frozen and thawed, and replanted to a live animal.

We can also look at neural tissue after vitrification, like here: http://www.alcor.org/Library/html/braincryopreservation1.htm...

After you've looked at this probably new evidence presented to you, do you still seriously claim that it's exactly equally as possible to retrive information from a cryopreserved brain as it is from a decomposed brain?

I don't believe you actually think that. I think that you've made the mistake to take two extremely unequal yet different and small probabilities to mean exactly the same.

If you assume that the probability that cryopreservation is 0.1%, then you should think that the probability to retrieve information from a decomposed brain to be lower than 0.001%. They're both really small, but they're not unequal.

Do you think that the probability is exactly the same? I rate such beliefs as not only wrong, but ignorant of empirical evidence.

Re: A Personal Statement from Iain Banks

#210

Post by SoftwareMaven »

penny1001 wrote: post #146
SoftwareMaven wrote: post #134

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For yourself, the best things you can do today is massively reduce your sugar (and high-fructose corn syrup, which is nearly identical) intake[1] and increase excercise[2]. Reducing sugar will cause you to increase other macro and micro nutrients that are healthier (which may help) and most likely cause you to loose weight if you need to (which will help). Unfortunately, until public policy on diet (which is set by t…

Why don't you link to peer-reviewed studies that definitively prove that corn and sugar cause cancer. It's quite disturbing and outrageous that you're using Iain's cancer to scare the public for political gain.

I have nothing to gain, so I think it odd that you would accuse me of doing this for political gain. I'm curious what political gain you think I could gain. I'm much more concerned about my kids growing up in a world where they can't escape sugar and HFCS being added to everything (including meat!) and the impact it will have on them and their kids.

Right now, there is no peer reviewed literature that definitively proves the sugar/cancer link. At best, there might be correlation.

Unfortunately, it is very difficult to get any funding for anything that might imply sugar is bad. The US, under pressure from the sugar lobby, threatened to pull $400M in WHO funding if they published a report saying "Too much sugar has bad side effect, you should limit consumption to 10% of your calories"[1][2][3]. The report was never published. This is made worse by 30 years of dogma, the fact that the FDA won't regulate substances that cause chronic diseases, and the conflict of interest the USDA has with coming up with what we "should" eat when their charter is to sell more crops.

I'm also not saying that if you don't eat sugar, you won't get cancer. Statistics apply to populations, not individuals. All I'm saying is there is probably a link between sugar and cancer, and, given sugar provides no positive nutritional value, cutting it out is probably a smart thing to do.

My heart goes out to Mr. Banks and his family and friends, just as much as my heart goes out to every cancer victim. As a society, we can do better.

1. http://www.guardian.co.uk/society/2003/apr/21/usnews.food

2. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC156706/

3. http://www.cspinet.org/new/200401161.html

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