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1,747 karma · joined July 4, 2013

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computer··on Mice Inherit Specific Memories, Because Epigenetics?
I don't have a problem with the research itself, I love that. But the presentation in this article is extremely sensationalist, using the word "memory" to make it seem like memories (in the human interpretation) are actually being transfered.

I have a big issue with using sensationalism in such a way that the average reader will read it in a way that's just completely wrong.

computer··on Government Chemist Tampered With 40,000 Cases
All 190,000 of them?
computer··on Mice Inherit Specific Memories, Because Epigenetics?
Related-- Would you call instinct a memory?

Instinct does not have physical attributes that completely and directly explain it, so the described behavior here is less of a memory than much of (the rest of) instict is.

computer··on Mice Inherit Specific Memories, Because Epigenetics?
The article mentions physical changes in the mice as a result of the smell (more specific receptors and neurons) which are explained within the current model by epigenetics: expression of "dormant genes" for those physical changes.

So, if those physical changes explain the mouse behavior response, then this has nothing to do with memories[1], and is not an unexpected outcome of the study within the current model.

This article is much too sensationalist, in my opinion.

[1] for reasonable definitions of a memory, of course.

computer··on Computer-driven cars will convulse the automotive industry
Here in Europe rail is mostly used for commuting and shorter distances in general. Especially in smaller countries. That part of rail is not competing with flying in any way.
computer··on Protests in Ukraine
When you say "Ukraine wants to increase cooperation with Europe", who do you mean by "Ukraine"?

The president? The people in the west (i.e. the ones protesting here)? The people in the east who only speak Russian?

computer··on Find the most reliable and fast public CDNs
Isn't actual real-world usage (market share) more important? If 99% of your users already has the resource cached, no request will be fired whatsoever.
computer··on I Am Not Satoshi
I don't think so; witch hunts didn't exactly grow trust between people in the middle ages. Witch hunts grow mob feelings between people against whoever happens to get crushed by their collective paranoia that day.
computer··on I Am Not Satoshi
One of the consequences of a public transaction chain is the great potential for witch hunts. Here's one of the first examples, but it surely won't be the last.
computer··on Web GL Ocean Simulation
Thank you for the Youtube fallback! (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IrUehq6vJss&feature=youtu.be)
computer··on Join the Compiler Creation Club
For an advanced version: The C++ Grandmaster Certification MOOC where participants build their own complete C++11 compiler in C++11 is still going strong: http://cppgm.org/
computer··on 25 years ago I hoped we would extend Emacs to do WYSIWG word processing
LyX is a great LaTeX WYSIWYM editor: http://www.lyx.org/
computer··on Winamp shutting down on December 20th, 2013
Thanks for that suggestion. Looking at its documentation, it seems that it does not support rating songs. Is that correct?
computer··on Winamp shutting down on December 20th, 2013
http://gmusicbrowser.org/ is the most similar open source music player, in my experience.
computer··on Winamp shutting down on December 20th, 2013
I always used Winamp on Windows, so when I switched to Linux I tried basically every single open-source alternative that worked with my workflow: Per-song ratings, a nested Genre/Artist/Album/Song library browser, global hotkeys, able to handle a collection of >100 GB and a useful playlist/queue system.

For anyone else looking for the same thing: the one that I ended up choosing was http://gmusicbrowser.org/. See http://gmusicbrowser.org/screenshots/ListsLibraryContext.png.

computer··on The tablet memory mark-up scandal
It's called market segmentation, and that by itself isn't a "scandal".
computer··on R-Fiddle
A related free service (but not a competitor) is http://rpubs.com/, to which you can publish R scripts, R-markdown files and more using a single mouse click from RStudio.
computer··on Stuxnet's Secret Twin
No such issue here. Try disabling javascript.
computer··on Our modern web theme goes live
This new PHP.net site is also dependent on javascript, as the search engine does not work without javascript.
computer··on Amsterdam pays alcoholics in beer to clean streets
"Amsterdam" should be "Some guy in Amsterdam who managed to get some limited government funding for his foundation". But that doesn't sound as good as title, I guess.
computer··on Is Google signing your chat messages?
It makes it possible to prove that someone didn't forge a chatlog, but that you really said X at some point based on your friend's chat logs.
computer··on Syntax Off (2012)
Don't forget to drop the indenting as well.
computer··on Self destructing emails that gmail or the NSA cant read
Sample link: https://secretink.co/read/2atelv15n5hqip59416c7c3c0q

Why does it send the decryption key to the server (presuming the data is even actually encrypted server-side)? Just use the megaupload model, where you link to an address containing a #, and then client-side javascript to decrypt.

Is it perfectly secure? Of course not, but at least then this company itself can't read them. Now there's nothing NSA-resistent about it. Just NSL secretink.

computer··on Introducing the Humble Store
Not a single game didn't work on Linux? Check out the current bundle. As far as I know none of the games work on Linux? They used to mention platform prominently. Now there's absolutely no mention on the front page of Linux, nor do they have the platform money split...

Definitely not the first time recently either.

computer··on Co-Founder of Youtube makes his first comment in 8 years
Comments actually broke for me yesterday after the Google+ comment integration. I suspect it's because they are now generated by a Google Plus hosted javascript, which is blocked on third party sites by default in my browser.

I don't mind.

computer··on Co-Founder of Youtube makes his first comment in 8 years
What are the issues? I've been considering getting a Nexus 5, but I don't use any Google services (perhaps besides the Google Play store). Will it be a brick?
computer··on Silk Road 2.0 Launches
He also promoted the site from a forum account with his real name and real name gmail account in another post.
computer··on Inputs.io hacked – 4100 BTC stolen
I read that he's an Australian citizen. But I'm not sure if anyone asked for his real identity (before trusting him with $1mm worth of bitcoin)
computer··on Silk Road 2.0 Launches
How are you going to find a seller? They use Tor, don't need to enter their details anywhere; they just send packages to addresses they receive in encrypted form.
computer··on Finding the right CDN for our startup
Just adding my personal experience: my sites went from a 30ms response time (measured by Google's webmaster tools, as Googlebot sees it) to over 250ms on CloudFlare, for static (cacheable) content.

Turning it back off gave a very clear improvement both in my own experience and according to Google's chart.

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