Cool sites, can you live by cool sites alone?

Cool sites, can you live by cool sites alone?
I think the answer to this is yes. If you can save as favourites all the current ‘cool’ sites then I don’t think you ever need go out again.
You can buy everything you need from i-Tunes, Amazon and e-bay and can get your food shopping from Tesco home deliveries. Your entertainment can come from YouTube and i-Player. Your social life can come from Facebook. Anything you want to know can be found on Wikipedia. Sign up to the latest web crazes and you’ll be well informed, trendy and have all the friends you need. Get on the message boards for real ‘conversations’. Get on X-Box Live for real entertainment. Why would you want to go out with real people!
This is a link to the social networking website facebook:

href="http://www.facebook.com/login.php">

Whether I have used Web 1 or 2 to achieve all this is pretty irrelevant. Did anyone even know Web 1 was Web 1, did anyone care!



All that matters is that the natural development of the sites enables me to do more and more - and that they are more interactive, respond faster and can be manipulated to do what I want to do or see. Like looking at a Google earth map of a place I'm thinking of visiting to see whether it’s actually worth going or to check out the route. To do a virtual tour of a hotel that I want to stay in, rather than just look at a brochure. A 360 degree look at this stuff in real time would be better still - will this require Web 3?

This is a link to a YouTube video made by Michael Wesch which looks into ways we use Web2.0 and the way the web uses us. Wesch calls this video The machine is Us/ing Us
">

Do Second life and Simulators serve useful purposes?

Two things in today’s lecture stood out, second life and simulators. This blog will look into answering the question do they serve any useful purpose?



Second life is literally that engaging in an unreal, artificial dream like world where you can pretend to be who you want, look like Brad Pitt rather than Homer Simpson get all the girls, success and money you can’t get in your real life. Is there any harm in this probably not, for some though further failure in their second life could drive some over the edge and even end up with them being suicidal.
Some could see their second life as a way of practicing for their first life. Trouble is it’s not real. There are some cross over’s now with reference to the Stock Exchange. You can even attend college.

This is a link to the new avatar film which uses avatars similar to second life.
http://www.avatarmovie.com/

Here is a link to second life.
http://secondlife.com/whatis/?lang=en-US

Simulators though are in some ways part of this and yet, their purpose in a training environment seems far more ‘normal’ and useful. Better to train someone to be a pilot or doctor in a safe simulation environment than in the real world where life and death are the consequences of your actions. Better to practice in an environment made as real as possible without the dire consequences. You can still build into simulations real emergencies to respond. Like the pilot who landed the plane on the river in America who said it was down to his training that he accomplished such a successful landing – part of which would have been on simulators.
So to answer the question second life no, simulators yes.

Will Ray Kurstweil’s theories ever become reality?

Today’s lecture touched on Ray Kurtsweil and his three predictions for 2099. He reckons by then human thinking will posses no advantage over computer minds. This made me what to explore an answer to the question; will Ray Kurstweil’s theories ever become reality? Technology is moving forward rapidly but will computer technology have developed sufficiently to match human thinking by the. Computers tend to be rational and logical in their decision making and tend to rely on pre-programmed knowledge to inform decisions made. They can weigh up known variables and perform ‘what ifs’ when these are known. Can they do this to the unknown what about gut instinct, hunches and just feeling lucky can you replicate this. This is where there is always an advantage for human thinking that unknown X factor, which you can’t programme.
His second prediction is that machines will have attained equal legal status with humans. This probably will depend on the type of machine. A machine that has some form of independent thought or decision making ability may well be protected. Is this not a logical development from freedom for slaves, the animal rights act – next stage robots would seem logical. People are generally against exploitation and abuse and I can see this happening, if only around proper maintenance and care of the product. It will say something about the type of person the owner is and at present all machines are owned by someone, there are no independent machines. Machines are at the end of the day a tool for a purpose and robots thinking machines will be no different to this.
His third prediction is that humans and machines will merge together in the physical and mental realms. I think this is likely there are already signs of this in the medical world. With bionic fingers in the paper last week, and a range of machines that can keep the heart beating, the lungs breathing and the blood cleaned etc. We know the brain can control simple devices directly now what in the future. Artificial limbs become more sophisticated, hearing and seeing devices are common place.

This is a link to a video profile of Ray Kurtsweil
http://www.kurzweiltech.com/media/ray_profile.mov

The link below shows the news story relating to bionic fingers: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/scotland/edinburgh_and_east/8401205.stm



On the entertainment front machines offer almost limitless opportunities. Gaming machines and avatars offer a new world experience and a life that you only previously dreamed about. Simulators offer opportunities to do all those things that you can’t normally do, fly planes, drive fast cars etc. Second worlds already exist in the gaming world and crossovers are already happening. 2099 read 2059.