Posts from — January 2005

Ethics for the Robot Age:
Jordan Pollack argues that the ethical questions surrounding robotics ŠŠ should robots carry weapons, how closely should humans and robots be integrated, etc. ŠŠ should receive much more attention now before the robot revolution hits.

interesting…. some of the questions are central to our consideration of what constitutes an ethical subject, combined with our notions of control.

Ethics for the Robot Age:
Jordan Pollack argues that the ethical questions surrounding robotics ŠŠ should robots carry weapons, how closely should humans and robots be integrated, etc. ŠŠ should receive much more attention now before the robot revolution hits.

interesting…. some of the questions are central to our consideration of what constitutes an ethical subject, combined with our notions of control.

Google comfort button : ‘The infamous “I…:
Google comfort button: ‘The infamous “I feel lucky” is nearly never used. However, in trials it was found that removing it would somehow reduce the Google experience. Users wanted it kept. It was a comfort button.’ [via visakopu.net]

This is very interesting…. it seems to me to be sort of like when you walk down the street and something is missing, like a store closed, or perhaps they moved the newspaper machines or something, just something ‘not quite right’.

Researchers discover European genetic twist: printer friendly version:
It is particularly surprising that the same genetic element should promote fertility and longevity since most organisms are obliged to follow a strategy either of breeding fast during short lives or of living longer and having fewer children. “Usually people think of there being a trade-off between fertility and longevity,” said Alan Rogers, a population geneticist at the University of Utah.

——–

ok…. wouldn’t a better explanation of this be that with increased fertility there is a greater chance to spread the gene and thus it should grow as a percentage of population over time?

Bare Bones Guide to HTML:
Award winning resource for HTML development, available in multiple languages.
this could be handy

Development Gateway Launches Software Tool For International Relief and Development Coordination:
January 11, 2005 – The Development Gateway Foundation has launched an open source software tool that organizations can use to coordinate international relief and development efforts. Called the Local Projects Database (LPD), this tool can be downloaded from the web. See http://lpd.sourceforge.net/

very interesting……

i’ve finally put up my movies that i’ve made for quite some time at http://pictures.tmttlt.com/movies/ there are some interesting images and some interesting clips, and stuff.

Welcome aboard SS-UNITED-STATES.COM:
http://www.ss-united-states.com/index.html

eScholarship Editions: University of California Press:
University of California Press and the California Digital Library’s eScholarship program. More than 400 of the titles are available to the general public; the rest are for University of California faculty, staff, and students only.

Weblogs as Pedagogy:

Barbara Ganley’s recent post about how the tool is becoming indistinguishable from the course makes it clear just how far down the blog road she has travelled.

snip

As both Aaron and Barbara ask, however, which comes first, the tools or the pedagogy? The easy answer is that the pedagogy should drive the decisions about tools. But these days, the tools offer ways to really transform the pedagogy in ways we haven’t even begun to think about yet. That’s what Barbara is immersed in. And that’s what we’ll need more of to realize whatever potential there is.

———–

i think this is the wrong question to ask. the question to ask is “what can i do next?”, and then use whatever tools you have. pedagogies are tools; are technologies. when you start saying which determines which, you start dismissing the key point/fulcrum of learning, which is the student, the learner. that person or those people determine both the technologies and pedagogies. (note: i put this into a form closer to english on 1-18)