From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 X-Spam-Checker-Version: SpamAssassin 3.4.4 (2020-01-24) on polar.synack.me X-Spam-Level: X-Spam-Status: No, score=-1.9 required=5.0 tests=BAYES_00,FREEMAIL_FROM autolearn=unavailable autolearn_force=no version=3.4.4 X-Received: by 2002:a24:7d10:: with SMTP id b16mr7258931itc.23.1546811228120; Sun, 06 Jan 2019 13:47:08 -0800 (PST) X-Received: by 2002:a9d:da3:: with SMTP id 32mr1219076ots.3.1546811227827; Sun, 06 Jan 2019 13:47:07 -0800 (PST) Path: eternal-september.org!reader01.eternal-september.org!feeder.eternal-september.org!news.gegeweb.eu!gegeweb.org!usenet-fr.net!proxad.net!feeder1-2.proxad.net!209.85.166.215.MISMATCH!k10no593506itk.0!news-out.google.com!v71ni555ita.0!nntp.google.com!k10no593502itk.0!postnews.google.com!glegroupsg2000goo.googlegroups.com!not-for-mail Newsgroups: comp.lang.ada Date: Sun, 6 Jan 2019 13:47:07 -0800 (PST) In-Reply-To: Complaints-To: groups-abuse@google.com Injection-Info: glegroupsg2000goo.googlegroups.com; posting-host=85.168.19.89; posting-account=O_NgcgoAAABs6pgCjroQBmOBL5ZZGPUc NNTP-Posting-Host: 85.168.19.89 References: <2a6929c5-72fa-4d84-953a-44ea4597ab38@googlegroups.com> <9e6b4219-d6ba-4c89-814d-5ea6e48ed8ea@googlegroups.com> <9179093f-4765-47a9-9dc6-147c9d7d6c56@googlegroups.com> <809a445d-cf73-4525-a732-67dbf24e8394@googlegroups.com> <1e4f3e15-afe4-4ca3-b039-11c6918f9977@googlegroups.com> <62759210-af49-4590-a1d6-b73058bb5053@googlegroups.com> User-Agent: G2/1.0 MIME-Version: 1.0 Message-ID: Subject: Re: class wide iterable (and indexable) From: George Shapovalov Injection-Date: Sun, 06 Jan 2019 21:47:08 +0000 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="UTF-8" Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable Xref: reader01.eternal-september.org comp.lang.ada:55230 Date: 2019-01-06T13:47:07-08:00 List-Id: Ditto on the generics and core language limitations. This thread came out e= xactly out of trying to reimplement something that should have been there t= o begin with.. On Sunday, January 6, 2019 at 9:32:07 PM UTC+1, Dmitry A. Kazakov wrote: > > Thus the proliferation of all these recent popular services of=20 [..] > This is well advertised snake oil. Most of the software is. We sell=20 > people solutions for non-existent problems in order to create new, even= =20 > more imaginary, problems, for which we will sell solutions too... Yes and no.=20 Mostly yes for selling snake oil to mass market. However some of these tool= s may be extremely useful. For example an effective literature mining tool = that could "pre-digest" en-mass searches indivisualized to a specific indiv= idual/project. Not merely a collection of a keywords with links (what most = of the "services" I tried provide as of now), but going beyond that. I woul= d appreciate such a tool a lot. The reality of modern science is that even = to stay up to day with on a single topic can easily take a significant amou= nt of time, even with spending only a few min per (more essential) paper. A= nd I tend to have rather wide interests.. Fortunately this issue may be fix= able in near future, as there is some development in this area. Recently I = had a chat with some startup developers orienting on Bio field, with the go= al to provide a tool (of course a popular now term AI was used more than on= ce) to help biotech/pharma companies (who are normally chronically behind o= n "proper science" and comprehension of mechanisms they are supposed to stu= dy, but who have a lot of money). They had an interesting idea that could a= ctually be workable. Only they were too optimistic IMO about its "hands-off= " work perspectives. When I expressed my concerns and usual point that tool= s addressing complex problems typically have complicated interface to deal = with all the necessary details, the response was - "oh, it will totally wor= k, and that's the beauty of this visualization approach", but they yet had = that common situation "over a year in production and already trying to get = sales but no finished product yet, we have to train people to be our end po= ints dealing with customers" - quite telling :). But to someone who has a sense of the subject in general and reasonable exp= erience with non-trivial tools, such a system could be very useful. The mai= n issue is the usual dumbing down for mass user which, more often than not,= throws the baby out with the water.. > > But I would like to see it taken to yet another level, with a more effe= ctive exchange protocols, going beyond mere verbal communication. This is h= owever is yet ways off, as it depends on installing another common layer of= direct-to-brain data exchange first and standardizing it (with a huge pote= ntial for abuse of course). >=20 > Not in the near future. So far we know basically nothing about our=20 > brain. It is like taking IR images of the motherboard while compiling=20 > Ada program... You would be amazed about what is going on in some labs :). And "knowing ba= sically nothing" does not stop people. But that was exactly my point - we c= an already do amazing things which we do not fully understand or control. U= sually there is a general, sufficiently clear idea which gets tested on a s= imple system. Then to make it workable people scale up the hard/wet-ware si= de and go talk to bioinformaticians to get some software to deal with the d= ata. In some cases this actually gets off the ground on a more complex use = cases and start working without either side having a good understanding of = exactly what is going on. CS people have no real idea of biology behind, an= d biologists are totally blank on the complexity of the software that is tr= ying to hold things together. And none of them have even a slightest idea a= bout physical processes underlying this, and in many cases those are also i= mportant. But in the current scientific environment - "publish positive or = perish" - nobody cares as long as there is some result that can be passed o= ff as "hey, it worked!". But sometimes it does work and does something nont= rivial :). Although true cross-discipline is sadly very rare, but then ther= e simply not that many people who can handle it. And you would need at leas= t one person sufficiently fluid in Biotech, physics/engeneering and softwar= e to keep it all in perspective.. Of course the ultimate goal I stated above is ways off, but I do have an id= ea how that could be achieved :).But that's not a "simple idea", it does re= quire a gradual testing of multiple layers, finally finishing the neural/co= mputer interfacing is one of them (work on that has been going on, here and= there, for over 15 years already with some things quite workable, but no (= at least in the open) systemic push to get it finished and tested properly)= . Contyrol of invasive properties of the cells is also underway for quite s= ome years. But most of the research is concentrated on specific tissues/dis= eases with people mostly happy with just receiving the next tranche of gran= t money, then publishing, then doing it all over again with a small tweak t= o what has just been done. But that's academia for you, doing a grossly dif= ferent ambitious thing is counter to well-being in that environment :). > > But now this is getting deep into bioengeneering, way away from the ori= ginal subject or even this group focus.. >=20 > Eugenics, you mean... (:-)) Nope, honest bioengeneering - coupling hard-, soft- and wet-ware together ;= ). If only I could find some company with enough resources and truly intere= sted (I can think of many applications, from biotics, prosthetics to milita= ry). I have been getting that feeling for a year or two already, that this = is becoming feasible and now is the time to start.. George