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Google announces Calico, a new company that will focus on health and well-being

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Re: Google announces Calico, a new company that will focus on health and well-being

#321

Post by agumonkey »

coldtea wrote: post #305
robotresearcher wrote: post #230

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Who's ahead of the [self-driving car] game? I don't know because Google gets all the press and fawning from fanboys--like you. It's Google. They have the right people, the right ideas, the resources, and they started first. Source: I'm a prof in a related field with graduated PhD students at Google. The Google cars get press because they are really very good.

> It's Google. They have the right people, the right ideas, the resources, and they started first. I believe we covered the "fawning from fanboys" part already. > Source: I'm a prof in a related field with graduated PhD students at Google. That's not a "source". That's at best a "full discosure" and at worst a "conflict of interest" in this discussion...

Sebastian Thrun's team was the first winner of DARPA driverless vehicles (2nd year) challenge, the year before that contestants failed very early. Do you know car manufacturers with such know-how ? They probably had research about it but I doubt they were as complete. Since Google backed the project they did very extensive tests in the real world. GM and such are bringing back computer aided driving but I'm sure they're too busy sustaining their business to put resources in something as disruptive and risky.

Re: Google announces Calico, a new company that will focus on health and well-being

#322

Post by mhartl »

bowlofpetunias wrote: post #96

Most of the world suffers from the health problem of never even reaching a ripe old age, and much of the rest from the problem of not being able to afford it, and increasingly so. This is not about making the world a better place. This about allowing the elite that can afford it to live forever.

This basic argument could be used against any new technology, ever.

Re: Google announces Calico, a new company that will focus on health and well-being

#323

Post by brudgers »

dekhn wrote: post #202
jrockway wrote: post #192

Earlier quoted context omitted.

He's making fun of the buzzwords, not the message itself. Frankly, if you think "catalyzing paradigms" is a good way to say something, I'd recommend taking an English literature class.

Err... catalyzing a paradigm change makes perfect sense to me. I think Thomas Kuhn might have used that in his book, "The Structure of Scientific Revolutions". A lit class isn't going to make any comment on a phrase like that, or management speak in general. Management speak is just a jargon.

Kuhn popularized the phrase "paradigm shift."

In his view, it occurred over generations as adherents to older scientific models died of old age - e.g. the Copernican model replaced the Ptolomeic model because Ptolomeic astronomers went extinct.

Re: Google announces Calico, a new company that will focus on health and well-being

#324

Post by dragonwriter »

Bakkot wrote: post #197
malandrew wrote: post #95

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Generational warfare would definitely be something to consider. Imagine if immortality had been discovered 400 years ago. Are the ethics and morality of the leaders from 400 years ago something you, a person born in the late 20th century, would want to live under? Generations eventually dying off keeps the human race moving forward in many ways.

Imagine if we grew up in a world like the one you posit, where humanity advances only slowly because it's held back by the ideals held by people 400 years old. You propose that the best solution to this is kill everyone over 80. That would make you a psychopath.

Or, imagine that you didn't like the dominant views among the 50-60 year olds in power when you were in your twenties, and you offered up the idea that we should just withold medical treatment from people over 30 so that we could increase the speed of social progress.

Re: Google announces Calico, a new company that will focus on health and well-being

#325

Post by Eliezer »

jrockway wrote: post #192
clicks wrote: post #190

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Your snark is unnecessary and very misplaced. This will result in a significant thought paradigm shift in all things health-related, and it's a great thing that a company with as many resources and as high of a profile as Google is looking into this. Google is a company that is making self-driving cars, providing incredibly fast internet to consumers, providing Internet to suffering areas with a new idea (the Loon),…

He's making fun of the buzzwords, not the message itself. Frankly, if you think "catalyzing paradigms" is a good way to say something, I'd recommend taking an English literature class.

I recommend not taking an English lit class, and instead going to your local library and borrowing some well-worn books on how to write by actual authors. And not literary authors either.

Re: Google announces Calico, a new company that will focus on health and well-being

#326

Post by dekhn »

dragonwriter wrote: post #245
dekhn wrote: post #202

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Err... catalyzing a paradigm change makes perfect sense to me. I think Thomas Kuhn might have used that in his book, "The Structure of Scientific Revolutions". A lit class isn't going to make any comment on a phrase like that, or management speak in general. Management speak is just a jargon.

> Management speak is just a jargon. Its mostly not. Jargon is specialized use of terms used to facilitate clear communication of ideas within a specific community/domain. Management speak -- at least the form that is often mocked -- is just using flowery language to conceal the absence of substance, and is pretty much the opposite of jargon.

I disagree. I hear your complaint from many people, but I spend enough time talking to managers to understand what they mean, and I actually think there's content there.

Re: Google announces Calico, a new company that will focus on health and well-being

#327

Post by dekhn »

coldtea wrote: post #304
dekhn wrote: post #202

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Err... catalyzing a paradigm change makes perfect sense to me. I think Thomas Kuhn might have used that in his book, "The Structure of Scientific Revolutions". A lit class isn't going to make any comment on a phrase like that, or management speak in general. Management speak is just a jargon.

> Err... catalyzing a paradigm change makes perfect sense to me. I think Thomas Kuhn might have used that in his book, "The Structure of Scientific Revolutions". And I think he wouldn't have touched that phrase with a barge pole. > Management speak is just a jargon. No. Jargon comes out of necessity and field-specific needs. Management speak comes out of the desire to unecessarily dress-up bullshit.

To catalyze something means to speed it up.

So catalyzing a paradigm change means to make it happen faster.

I don't see the problem with this. Could you be more specific?

Re: Google announces Calico, a new company that will focus on health and well-being

#328

Post by throwawaay »

bsullivan01 wrote: post #309
piyush_soni wrote: post #283

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No other company has reached so far in self driving cars as Google has. Learn to live with it.

OK, you hit a nerve, so I'll keep beating a dead horse: says who? Who made a side by side study of all the efforts in self driving cars? http://www.latimes.com/business/autos/la-fi-hy-autos-mercede...

"... Mercedes-Benz announced Monday that it had successfully driven an autonomous S-Class sedan 62 miles on German city streets."

Well, shit, that quote right there plus your hostile attitude sure have me impressed. 62 whole miles! They're clearly on the doorstep of releasing a production autonomous car, as you were trying to imply over at " rel="nofollow">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6408590>.

Meanwhile, that other company's car has made the trip from San Francisco to Los Angeles (at least 380 miles, in case you didn't know):

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/12/06/science/sebastian-thrun-se...

That was two years ago.

Here's a suggestion: why don't you just take a step back from the topic of Google, since you clearly get all twisted up inside about it?

Re: Google announces Calico, a new company that will focus on health and well-being

#329

Post by Eliezer »

PeterisP wrote: post #155

An interesting trend is that we're now no longer relying on governments to pursue big, hairy, audacious goals. Governments and also capital markets nowadays seem unable to pursue any really long-term projects at all. Instead, all the future-advancing progress seems to be made by independently rich individuals; and also not by the "aristocratic-rich" families, but by noveau riche upstarts such as Brin, Musk and others…

In the depths of the Great Stagnation, all significant technological progress occurs due to ascended post-exit Silicon Valley moguls personally funding it (with money they own or fully control) out of the goodness of their own hearts. Venture capitalists can't see how to flip it in 3 years and science bureaucrats can only give money to other bureaucrats.

Re: Google announces Calico, a new company that will focus on health and well-being

#330

Post by ianstallings »

ianstallings wrote: post #181
king_jester wrote: post #149

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I have no problem with free market capitalism, if it's fair. Free market capitalism isn't fair. All the dynamics and mechanics of capitalism have nothing to do with fairness.

I should have qualified that statement more. What I meant was I am against rigging the system and cronyism. "Free market" was the wrong term. I prefer a market that is overlooked by society, with the authority given to government. It's a balance that is still unfair in a lot of aspects of course, because with a winner there is a loser. But the fairness comes in the fact that anyone can be a winner. We're still workin…

Overseen also. Overlooked? Well.. that already happens.
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