Tag Archives: NASA

The path we make

The path we make is often set, for one, you cannot walk the path of (fake) AI without considering the side-roads called Data Verification and Data Validation. They are intertwined. And whenever I get to Data Validation, NASA tends to be own my mind. They have been on the Data Validation path as early as the 70’s, long before whomever runs IBM/Microsoft/Google now, they were already looking at ways to support their validation tracks. So when I see the combination of NASA and DATA I tend to look up and take notice. So when we get ‘NASA POWER’s PRUVE Tool Streamlines Data Validation’ (at https://www.earthdata.nasa.gov/news/blog/nasa-powers-pruve-tool-streamlines-data-validation) where we see “NASA’s archive of Earth observation and modeling datasets has an incredibly diverse range of uses, and assessing data uncertainty is a critical step toward ensuring the data and analyses are accurate, reliable, and trustworthy. Several factors, such as instrument calibration, atmospheric corrections, and land-surface albedo, can affect the quality of satellite data. For users working with solar and meteorological datasets, quantifying uncertainty is especially critical, as these data often inform decisions and policymaking at the community level.” And this introduction leads towards the two quotes “NASA’s Prediction of Worldwide Energy Resources (POWER) project, which provides datasets from NASA in support of energy, buildings, and agroclimatology decisions, developed a tool that enables users to assess data uncertainty for selected surface variables from POWER’s data catalog with corresponding surface measurements.” And “The cloud-based tool — the PaRameter Uncertainty ViEwer (PRUVE) — makes assessing data uncertainty more straightforward for users across disciplines and skill levels. PRUVE uses surface observed site meteorological data from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) and surface radiation data from Baseline Surface Radiation Network (BSRN) to compare against POWER-provided surface meteorological and radiation data values. This user-friendly application gives users an opportunity to quickly confirm data validation through customizable queries.

So when we see “By creating the free, easy-to-use PRUVE tool, the POWER team instills an additional layer of trust, empowering users to tackle some of the most important long-term weather challenges facing our planet.” I feel doubt and I do know that this is in me, not because of what is promised, but consider the settings in the example we see “a student wanting to install a small wind turbine for a study project at their college. They are limited by size and cost, so they need to make sure the predictions and analyses are reliable. As part of the study, they can use wind and other historical data parameters available through POWER to forecast how much energy will be produced from the wind turbine system. The student wants to limit the level of uncertainty in their prediction calculations as much as possible.” All whilst we also see:

So where is the doubt? You see for the most there is no doubt in the powers that ‘reside’ within NASA, but when you see these facts, why this system is not ‘coexisting’ in the Google, IBM or Microsoft clouds? This system should (read: optionally could) be adjustable to these fake AI systems to smooth over validation and reduce error in whatever data there is. And I do know that it is not that simple, but consider the settings that are lacking now, the transference of these options might also fill the coffers of NASA and there is no way they don’t need that. And as my skeptical self realizes nearly all the data systems on the planet require additional layers of trust, but that might merely be me. 

So as I see it, nearly all data systems are set towards some setting that there is some side solution towards data validity, all whilst there is a direct need to make checking the validity of data a main priority. So what happens when this solution gets additional layers of data validation, in part in statistics to see if the validation sets statistical boundaries whether the data set in some normal way, but that limits the setting is an outlier is found, so how can that be validated? Then there are multiple factors where a value should behave in certain ways, but it would not be easy. I reckon that NASA could pull it off and it would be a tool that everyone needs. I merely wonder why no-one has considered it before. Now, I do understand that it is a tall order and I might be incorrect (read: full of it) but consider how meteorological numbers are achieved, consider that there will be error, but a setting that reduces error in validation. A system that reiterates the data given and considers whether validation passes of fails. A system like that could be made, but the issue are the outliers, so what makes an outlier valid, because if one outlier is wrongfully ‘deleted’ the data set could become invalid. So is this possible? I think that only NASA with its expertise could make such a system a reality, making data validation more readily available. Because no matter what verification process follows and whilst we await the coming of real AI, validation will still be a setting that is required in whatever data system comes to the surface of true AI. And perhaps the system will become a verification setting, both are required and neither system seems to be ‘correctly’ developed at present. It is a horrible conundrum, but it requires contemplating as such a system is needed by the time Real AI comes to all our doorsteps. 

The additional issues I see is that in this case the PRUVE tool has all these connecting data segments, but what happens when it is a little more complex? We have all our minds set to ‘connected’ data, but it isn’t that simple at times. Consider the ludicrous setting of length and shoe size. Now we can understand the setting of a 4’8” person with 17” shoes (he wishes), but is it out of the realm of possibilities? There is a girl named Shae, who claims she knows one person with that description (Game of Thrones joke). So how would you be able to validate this? Perhaps other data is required to make the clear distinction valid and how could such a system make validation reliable? As I see it, the biggest problem into validating data is being able to recognise the outliers. I see the deletion of outliers as a problem, the data loses reliability and verification become next to impossible. Its like watching a dataset limited without data from the Interquartile Range (or 3-Sigma Rule) and as I see it, whatever data you remain with makes actions like fraud detection close to impossible (unless that transgressor is extraordinary stupid). You see there is the ‘old’ premise that “Outliers can bias statistical estimates, causing inaccurate results in predictive models or misrepresentations in descriptive statistics.” I am not saying it is incorrect, but the absence of outliers could make the validity of that data a lot more dubious and finding this is a real challenge, so as far as I see it, That is a job for NASA (the keyword Superman was already taken by DC comics). 

So see this as a little trip on the brainstorming front, I definitely need a hobby and I am all out of licorice.

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Two carbon based stories

Yup, we have carbon based cars, carbon based credit cards and also carbon based stories (this one). You see, two stories brought it up to the front in all this. The second story is given to us by the Guardian. It is ‘how a UAE sheikh quietly made carbon deals for forests bigger than UK’ (at https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2023/nov/30/the-new-scramble-for-africa-how-a-uae-sheikh-quietly-made-carbon-deals-for-forests-bigger-than-uk) where we are given “The rights over vast tracts of African forest are being sold offin a series of huge carbon offsetting deals that cover an area of land larger than the UK. The deals, made by a little-known member of Dubai’s ruling royal family, encompass up to 20% of the countries concerned” and the one missing part is that this concerns Sheikh Ahmed Dalmook al-Maktoum. We see here a larger impact into how business is done, how corporations and how governments do business. A simple setting, no laws broken and all on the up and up. 

You see, this relates to the entirety with the first article that we also got from the Guardian titled ‘Most sponsors of Cop28 have not signed up to UN-backed net zero targets’ (at https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2023/nov/29/most-sponsors-cop28-not-signed-up-to-un-net-zero-targets). Here we see “Most companies sponsoring the UN climate talks in Dubai are not committed to cutting their greenhouse gas emissions in line with globally recognised net zero targets, it has been revealed”. You see, the hands of the Guardian aren’t clean either. They refused (and failed) to report on the EEA report that showed that 50% of all the damage came from 147 facilities. They don’t give you that part do they? They will report on jets for rich people and whilst they hide behind their ‘walls’ they cater to who-knows-who. In addition there is the article from former NASA engineer Mark Rober (at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U7nJBFjKqAY) he showed how 20,000,000 trees were being planted. The article was from 2019 and so far they are at 24,513,083 trees. As such that team did more than most western governments. And they are still at it. So whilst we are pointing fingers and whilst the media is all about the blame game (more digital dollars) others are doing things, others are making it happen. Should Sheikh Ahmed Dalmook al-Maktoum decide to donate to TeamTrees ($1 per tree) we could see that the UAE has done more by itself then all the European nations (and the United Kingdom) combined. Scary isn’t it?

Another field where America and Europe fall short. A simple equation and a simple outcome. So whilst we are all wondering what all that carbon tax is all about others are actually doing something about it, but the media will not give us that snippet of news, will they?

So whilst we consider that, also consider “The global accountancy firm EY, formerly Ernst and Young, which has been hired as the independent verifier of the climate record of all the sponsors, has also not set targets with the net zero scheme.” Another target not met, another target in the wind and the media stays quiet (or something like that). 

So whilst we look at COP28 and point fingers towards some, consider that it was that this Swedish Primary School kid named Greta Thunberg showed us that COP26 was all about ‘blah blah blah’ she was proven correct and how much media coverage did they get? So whilst CNN gives us ‘US announces rule to slash powerful planet-warming gas by nearly 80%’, the part we all seem to miss is that this target is set by 2038 and we should not forget that there is every chance that at that point there will be no United States of America left. When their debts explode, no environmental target will count, no target will matter but that part will only come to the surface AFTER the collapse (and that will make sense). 

So much blah blah blah and none of them are doing anything real about it, the only ones doing things and making things happen is TeamTrees, consider that this weekend.

Cheerio.

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The brotherhood of NASA

OK, I took notice of news today. I only took notice today as it either escaped my attention, or the western coverage has been dismal. But the BBC (at https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-66590446) gives notice that India is now the 4th nation to land on the moon. Preceded by USA, Russia and China it nows becomes a member of a very exclusive club. Not the UK, not France and not Germany. None of them made membership to the American Express Stellar Black Card (an extremely exclusive version of the AMEX card), it was India who did. And I am happy for India. A nation most nations and its citizens look down on, sneer at and make fun of. That nation is now a lunar nation.

The interesting part is that no one is ‘cashing’ in on that, on the pride. So above is an image, part of an image of a board game I remember playing in the 70’s. It was all about NASA then. I was watching in amazement to the TV when someone left a footprint on the moon (no negativity implied). The board game fuelled our excitement. This is a different board game, but that is the part I remember. Now consider that same game on Facebook, on your mobile. To play with friends and others. 

All now watching the ISRO logo on their board. On trains, in the office (during coffee breaks) and the ISRO has earned it, they are 4th in a game that most would say that India is a horse no show. And India got there ahead of many others, even many G20 nations. They have earned their laurels. 

And for comedy, in light of the accusations that a NAFO fella kicked the Russian moon lander out of orbit I would like to offer the idea of a NAFO block card. If you have it, you can play it whilst the lander is orbiting the moon BEFORE it lands. Then you roll the dice again. With 1-5 the opponent is halted for one move, if you get a 6, the lander is destroyed and that player has to start again at the liftoff point. I saw the NAFO fella ‘documentary’ on Twitter, so it must be real.

But that last part is merely a funny moment for me to add an element. What matters is that there have been moon games going back to the 70’s, perhaps even before that and India can now use that to spread the fame of the ISRO, they have earned it. We can be all kinds of jealous, yet in the end they got to the moon. They might be 4th, but there is no way to tell what else they will achieve and we need to be reminded that greatness comes on all shapes and sizes and from almost every direction. The ISRO showed us this with the Chandrayaan-3. A moonlander who completed its landing on August 23rd 2023 and we should remember this. India has every right to be proud of this moment and so they should be.

Enjoy today and feel free to dream of whatever you want. 

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Our house is burning down. Down!

By now we have all heard of the fires in Canada. There is nothing that I can say, invent or imagine that makes this setting easier. These fires are making the fires of Rome (64AD) and burning of London (1666AD) look like a simple BBQ (or clambake if you are from the US). At this time the fires are well over 13,500,000 Hectare, and it has displaced around 200,000 people. Which is almost 1% of the population. The largest fire in recorded history. I have never ever heard of a fire this big and I have been around for well over half a century. I wonder what the eco-deniers make of this setting, who will they blame? The fact that from all over the world firefighters are coming to Canada to fight a fire too big to comprehend is only one setting. The stage that planes are so loaded that they need to turn away those fleeing the disaster they face. 

People wear protective masks as the Roosevelt Island Tram crosses the East River while haze and smoke from the Canadian wildfires shroud the Manhattan skyline in the Queens Borough New York City, June 7, 2023. REUTERS/Shannon Stapleton

And that is before you realise that NYC is orange, orange from smoke by Canadian fires. An event that has never happened before. So yes, I looked at plenty of issues before I looked at this. I am on the other side of the planet, but I took notice, I took notice several times and now I decided to write about it. 

The setting hasn’t changed, I did. I am starting to realise that that much forest gone will impact our oxygen supply and it will take lose to a decade for a decent amount to be rebuild. We can argue on the timeline. But the forests in the Amazon are depleted, the ones in Indonesia have seen depletion as well Indonesia lost 29.4 Mha of tree cover, equivalent to a 18% decrease in tree cover since 2000. Did you think that was nothing? Now the forests of Siberia are almost all that remain and I reckon that this is not a path we want to walk on. This fire might not be what we wanted, but there is a negative part in me that states that this is the fire we the people (not just Canadians) have been entitled to. A small reminder that exploitation of our world will hurt us all and people more intelligent than me would have been aware of this for several years and the Canadian fires are merely bringing it to the foreground. Some articles are drawing in the people by looking at how it started, some are set on the blame factor, but if you need someone to blame you only need to look into a mirror. Politicians are not held to account, all whilst driving the gravy train. We are being told that places like the UK that woodland creation has increased by 40 percent since last year to 3,128 hectares. It isn’t much, but it is a start, all being it being half a decade late. People like Mark Rober (formerly with NASA) have aided organisations like Team Trees, an organisation that as of 29 June 2023, the project has raised $24,438,806, exceeding the fundraiser’s goal to plant 20 million trees. As anticipated, more than 20 million trees have been planted. So one ex-NASA with an organisation achieved more in 2 years that the UK achieved in a decade and it is people like this that Canada will need, their solutions will be required when the fires are stopped. When? Your guess is as good as mine and it will rely on guessing as we have never faced a fire like this ever before, not in well over 2000 years as far as I can tell. 

So what is the option? I am not sure we have one, our house is burning down and whilst most houses have a garden to evacuate to, the planet has nothing surrounding itself but empty space and that is a place where we cannot survive. I wonder how long it will take some to blame the rich, tax everyone and whatever other solution people give, but the simple equation is that until we change our lives from a consumer based life towards an essential goods stage this will keep on going on. And with a little over 8,000,000,000 consumers in this house, we are destined for a larger failing than we care to admit to. You see it is not merely the fires, it is the simple equation where 34 million acres are not there to give us the oxygen we need to breath. So how short will our oxygen supply be in 2024? You can ignore it all you want but that will be the largest topic we ever faced and it is coming. None of it is the fault of Canada or Canadians. We all did our best to ignore Brazil and Indonesia. The media skated around the issue and now the blame game starts. Well as soon as the fires have been digitally exploited to the maximum. That is how I see it. Do you think I am wrong?

Enjoy the weekend and consider the numbers, the numbers tend to be correct.

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Huh? Wha? Duh!

I was a little baffled today. The article that I saw in Al Jazeera (at https://www.aljazeera.com/economy/2023/2/8/google-shares-tank-8-as-ai-chatbot-bard-flubs-answer-in-ad) had me. I saw the headline ‘Google shares tank 8% as AI chatbot Bard flubs answer in ad’. So I got to read and I saw “Shares of Google’s parent company lost more than $100bn after its Bard chatbot advertisement showed inaccurate information”, now there are a few issues here and one of them I mentioned before, but for the people of massively less intelligence, lets go over it again.

AI does not exist
Yes, it sounds funny but that is the short and sweet of it. AI does not exist. There is machine learning and there is deeper machine learning and these two are AWESOME, but they are merely an aspect of an actual AI. We have the theory of one element, which was discovered by a Dutch physicist, the Ypsilon particle. You see, we are still in the binary age and when the Ypsilon particle is applied to computer science it all changes. You see we are users of binary technology, zero and one. No and Yes, False and True and so on. The Ypsilon particle allows for a new technology. It will allow for No, Yes, Both and Neither. That is a very different kind of chocolate my friends. The second part we need and we are missing for now are shallow circuits. IBM has that technology and as far as I now they are the only ones with their quantum computer.  These two elements allow for an ACTUAL AI to become a reality. 

I found an image once that might give a better view, the image below is a collection of elements that an AI needs to have, do you think that this is the case? Now consider that the Ypsilon particle is not a reality yet and Quantum computers are inly in its infancy at present.

Then we get to the next part. Here we see “The tech giant posted a short GIF video of Bard in action via Twitter, describing the chatbot as a “launchpad for curiosity” that would help simplify complex topics, but it delivered an inaccurate answer that was spotted just hours before the launch event for Bard in Paris.” This is a different kind of candy. Before we get to any event we test and we test again and again and Google is no different, Google is not stupid, so what gives? Then we get the mother of all events “Google’s event came one day after Microsoft unveiled plans to integrate its rival AI chatbot ChatGPT into its Bing search engine and other products in a major challenge to Google, which for years has outpaced Microsoft in search and browser technology”, well apart from the small part that I intensely dislike Microsoft, these AI claims are set on massive amounts of data and Bing doesn’t have that, it lacks data and in some events it was merely copying other people’s data, which I dislike even further and to be honest, even if Bing comes with a blowjob by either Laura Vandervoort or Olivia Wilde. No way will I touch Bing, and beside that point, I do not trust Microsoft, no matter of ‘additions’ will rectify for that. It sounds a bit personal but Microsoft is done for and for them to chose ChatGPT is on them, but does not mean I will trust them, oh and the final part, there is no AI!

But it is about the error, what on earth was Google doing without thoroughly testing something? How did this get to some advertisement stage? At present Machine learning requires massive amounts of data and Google has it, Microsoft does not as far as I know, so the knee-jerk reaction is weird to say the least. So when we read “Bard is given the prompt, “What new discoveries from the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) can I tell my nine-year-old about?” Bard responds with a number of answers, including one suggesting the JWST was used to take the very first pictures of a planet outside the Earth’s solar system, or exoplanets. This is inaccurate, as the first pictures of exoplanets were taken by the European Southern Observatory’s Very Large Telescope (VLT) in 2004, as confirmed by NASA” this is a data error, this is the consequence of people handing over data to a machine that is flawed (the data, not the machine). That is the flaw and that should have been tested for for a stage that lasts months. I can only guess how it happened here, but I can give you a nice example.

1992
In 1992 I went for a job interview. During the interview I got a question on deviation, what I did not know that statistics had deviation. I came from a shipping world and in the Netherlands declination is called deviation. So I responded ‘deviation is the difference between true and magnetic north’, which for me was correct and the interviewer saw my answer as wrong, but the interviewer had the ability to extrapolate from my answer (as well as my resume) that I came from a shipping environment. I got that job in the end and I stayed there for well over 10 years. 

Anyway the article has me baffled to some degree. Google is better and more accurate all of the time, so this setting makes no sense to me. And as I read “A Google spokesperson told Reuters, “This highlights the importance of a rigorous testing process, something that we’re kicking off this week with our Trusted Tester programme.”” Yes, but it tends to be important to have rigorous testing processes in place BEFORE you have a public release. It tends to make matters better and in this case you do not lose $100,000,000,000 which is 2,000 times the amount I wanted for my solution to sell well over 50,000,000 stadia consoles for a solution no one had thought of, which is now solely the option for Amazon, go figure and Google cancelled the Stadia, go figure again.

The third bungle I expect to see in the near future is that they fired the wrong 12,000 people, but there is time for that news as well. Yes, Wednesday is a weird day this time around, but not to worry. I get to keep my sanity playing Hogwarts Legacy which is awesome in many ways. And that I did not have to test, it was seemingly properly tested before I got the game (I have not spotted any bugs after well over 20 hours of gameplay, optionally merely one glitch).

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The fickle entertainment industry

A few hours ago we were told that Henry Cavill will not return as Superman. The reason is not known to me. It was clear that he was eager and he did a magnificent role in Man of Steel, Batman vs Superman and Justice League. We saw him twice in a little exit shot in two movies, Shazam and another one. I honestly was looking forward to Gerald of Rivia to return as the man of steel (another fine franchise with Henry Cavill). We can speculate all we want, but the DC stage is up to James Gunn and Peter Safran and they have quite the plan brewing (from other small clips), their world is a lot bigger than the man of steel, how it all fits together is unknown to me and after the initial news in October that Henry would return, the setback will suck for all the Cavill fans around and he has plenty of those all over the world.

So as the BBC (at https://www.bbc.com/news/entertainment-arts-63983600) gives us “Gunn and Safran took over DC Studios in late October, just after Cavill made a surprise appearance as the Man of Steel during the credits of the Dwayne Johnson film Black Adam”, with the added “Among those on the slate is Superman. In the initial stages, our story will be focusing on an earlier part of Superman’s life, so the character will not be played by Henry Cavill.” It makes sense that this is chosen, but that also does not rule out Cavill in a future Superman movie (but that is pure speculation from my side). I reckon that we will have to wait until the new year as we are given “we’ll be able to share some exciting information about our first projects at the beginning of the new year”, so I reckon that January is a month of DC revelations and with the hit that is Black Adam, it could go in directions we cannot yet tell, but there is every chance that the DC fans will go bug nuts when they get the actual information. No matter how this turns out, we still have 2023 with upcoming Argylle. And three other titles with release dates that are currently TBA. There is The Ministry Of Ungentlemanly Warfare, The Rosie Project and some Highlander reboot. So there will be no shortage of Cavill in the cinema. For the rest, no matter where he is, he remains a local boy supporting the Jersey Reds. 

So we get it plans change and the entertainment industry is fickle to say the least, but to change gears to this degree in a span of 6 weeks is a little harsh to anyone facing it, and I think he took it and responded like a champ.

For me? Well I was looking forward to the next Superman movie because I remember the comics (Death of Superman) and the follow on where Clark Kent was revived and ended up a lot more Kryptonian than Kevin Costner left him, so I was kinda looking forward to that comic sequence to become silver screen reality. Still, I will have to wait what the DC bosses have in mind for us. I cannot give you anything real or any facts, I have to wait what comes just like all of you. Still, the stage gave me a few ideas to pursue towards the stories I put on this blog. I have now a clear grasp of Keno Diastima season 3, but a few issues on how to fill in the story, still I could not resist to make NASA part of it. And with the peeking solution called the James Webb space telescope I can look in other directions as well. The mini series is still at a standstill. I did come up with one hell of a twist ending, but there are a few other sides to it all, what we cannot see and what we were told (in school) are different settings and it gave me a few ideas. I’ll tell you soon how it pans out and there is a few more items on the shelf, I have not forgotten them, merely taking my time to consider the story on how it should (or could) evolve and that is the issue down the line. I have three plot lines running into season 3 and 4, and I am still looking at season 2. The stage that becomes the beginning of season 3 needs more ‘umph’, I cannot describe it any other way. The danger of any story written is that it has the danger of becoming too linear and I am trying to avoid that. Such is life. Time to snore and time to prepare for tomorrows challenge. 

Have fun all!

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Speculative design

Many do this at times. We look at something and we think ‘What if we move part N to location X?’ It is a perfectly valid idea and it keeps a brain active and in creative mode, which tends to be good for several reasons. So I was busy thinking things out, in one it is the side of pushing another IP towards public domain, it is too soon, but not by much. So the mind started to wander. The first part was the new trojan that the NSO group is suspected off (see previous story), the second was a line in the West Wing (which I am watching again during the lockdown plus curfew. There we hear about a pen designed for NASA that works upside down, one mentions that Russia solved it by using a pencil. You might not think it, but it is actually an important part. So as these elements rolled in my mind, I wondered on adding a setting (just to piss off the Iranians) in a stage to get two for the price of one, they do use Russian hardware. As such I thought that we need a few clever boffins and as such the people should call on the NSA (No Such Agency). What if we find a way to introduce a hippocampus to the hardware? A hippocampus is a trojan that is submerged (in this case) into the firing solutions. You see at some point a target needs to be setup and that moment the link becomes a weak link. You see not all systems have additional redundant systems and I am willing to bet that Iran has the latest hardware, but not every internal system is up to the latest standard. Implying that we can add something. So what if these missiles would then automatically start to be set to point X plus 1-10 miles? A submerged trojan horse might pull that off. There are a few questions that require me to have a lot more firing system knowledge. Yet when we consider the elements rocket-firing solution-guidance, we might see that the firing solution will be the easiest transgression and these systems do require to get to a base. A solution  that will hit EVERY firing system by infecting all the systems and the infection stays where it is until it fires and then it becomes a nice 4th July showtime. And there is a nice secondary part, the person firing is the one hitting ones self. Passive aggression in full view. 

So is my view realistic? I do not know, I do not care. I merely try to design a way to stop players like Iran and I will use any way possible. All whilst politicians make claims to do something and after spending truckloads on funds on long exclusive trips that tends to include a few 5 star hotels, I on the other hand, sitting on my sofa came up with ideas that had no cost, merely a few dimes of electricity. One works in whatever way the brain gets to be (more) creative. It was the same path I followed when I designed a way to push a  meltdown in the Iranian nuclear plants. OK, I also engineered two additional valve ideas and when I file for these I might get a few additional dollars as well. I do know that these solutions are pure concept, there is no guarantee it will work. But it keeps my brain busy and if it doesn’t work, it might make for a nice additional part to some TV series or movie. The creative brain can come up with a dozen ideas, just be ready that it ends up where it was not expected to go. You might find that funny and it is, but when you consider how books, games and movies got an infusion of brilliance. You merely have to consider how they got to be. Games like Ultima 3 became inspirations to a lot more RPG games (made by other makers). The EA game ShadowCaster was by way too many overlooked, yet when you see “the 49th best computer game of all time, calling it “an admirable attempt to show that RPGs don’t have to be boring””, so why was this game not remastered and redesigned for consoles and streamings? In that same light we can review all kinds of neglected hardware and see just how creative we could get with it. Everyone is so busy in making things not work that they overlook the option to make it hurt the activator and not the target. Perhaps we need to instil the need for people who work for no such agency to get better acquainted with gaming. You might not realise it but games have been on the fringe of hardware for at least 3 decades, optionally even longer and even as some ‘embrace’ that nowadays games are more advanced, people forget that the CBM-64 and Atari ST allowed for games that were often not possible, yet the game makers found a way around their limitations. Consider a game like Impossible mission (Epyx) and the fact that this game can still be enjoyed on an 8 bit system by any number of gamers today, and they got that done on a system with a mere 38KB, it can equal a game that requires an 8GB system, so there!

There are of course a few more ideas, but it is about the concept of working with limits. I ned not explain this to programmers, but some of them will grab an Azure SDK and start from there. We forget that that same company gave us the Microsoft Assembler. Azure solutions start at 765 kilo bits, whilst assembly gives us one of the smallest useful programs for a mere 4 bytes. It is not merely what solution is used, it is about what limitations can be used to our advantage and as a snow-globe gave me the idea to meltdown a reactor, an assembly program used to overcome some security on an EA game (8 bytes) might be the path to set the firing point of the Qiam-1 to the destination point as firing point + 10000 if the destination is measured in metres. At times we forget that having more space does not work, it requires limitations to give us the creativity we required to get it done.

Just my 2 bytes on the matter.

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Mapping insanity

OK, this is a weird one, and it could even apply to me. I was day dreaming a moment ago, and it is not one I had ever before. First let set the situation, in this setting I was acting, my co-players were Matt Damon and Arnold Vosloo, the director was Ridley Scott. I was given very direct orders, I had to yank Matt’s chains as much as possible. In one setting I was teaching  Matt’s character South African, I told him to replace ‘th’ with double f, and asked him to speak ‘When I was at school I thought a lot’, we get ‘When I was at school I fought a lot’ and heaven behold Arnold Vosloo loses his cool and laughs out loud, Matt’s character has a fit, a loud one, then it was Arnold’s turn. He makes mention on the daily events and I hear that Elon Must will be visiting the Prime Minister of New Zealand. I say “that makes no sense, oh, perhaps he is trying to buy the competitor, there are rumours that the New Zealand party has come up with a cheaper electrical car, $NZ 20,000, which is about $15,000. This might be making Elon Musk Nervous”, ‘really?’ Matt’s Character says. My response is “Yep, it amounts to $10,000 for the car and $5,000 for the extension cord”, more laughter except from Matt. 

Yet the reality is different. The story is about a shuttle that is set on a long trajectory because of a defect, it will take the shuttle another 5 months to get back to earth orbit, 3 months have already passed, and as we see into the shuttle, that has no flickering lights, but part of the shuttle is damaged we see Matt Damon in his chair, and when the camera turns to us, we see to dead bodies, Vosloo’s and my character are dead and Matt is dealing with isolation and a lack of resources, we see that this is a movie about insanity through isolation, we were the window dressing, Matt is there to show just how insane a man can come through isolation in a place where you cannot move to conserve oxygen, left with two dead co workers for month and the setting of a malfunctioning shuttle. All whilst the oxygen supply is not completely kosher. 

It is a psychological movie and I saw part of what could be an interesting journey into the mind of an Astronaut who lost it completely all whilst he is yet to learn that the DOD did this to test the Astronaut because of what is about to come and as we see the end titles, we see a much larger shuttle, with the cockpit looking just like the delusions that Matt’s character faced.

Well, that is it for now, anyway it is less upsetting than the actions of a US President who shall presently not be named (to make the accusation deniable).

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The List

What happens when we demand certain action by the media, yet that same media might not think it is in their interest to pursue such actions, will the people win, or will the media win. It is a direct question as we are being told (via the media) that we have been kept in the dark for years now and we need the media to step up, will they do it?

I have been playing with this idea for a while now and I think it has become a largely visible issue now. I am taking the action as per ‘Greenland’s ice sheet melting seven times faster than in 1990s‘ (at https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2019/dec/10/greenland-ice-sheet-melting-seven-times-faster-than-in-1990s), and it is time to recognise the players. 

The first fact is that this particular issue has been playing for well over 20 years, so we now have a timeline. Even as the media now alerts us through “Scale and speed of loss much higher than predicted, threatening inundation for hundreds of millions of people”, the issue has been playing for well over a decade, so we now can demand a list.

The list needs to show ANY scientist who have been hiding or trivialising facts. These scientists are NEVER EVER to be considered for government jobs or for environmental jobs, they are to be named and any of them attached to big business will find their presence to be a nullifying factor in assessing a company’s environmental value. When we are given the value “Glaciers calving icebergs in south-west Greenland, which has lost 3.8tn tonnes of ice since 1992, and the rate of ice loss has risen from 33bn tonnes a year in the 1990s to 254bn tonnes a year in the past decade“, we need to see the dangers that some scientists have presented us with. So any scientist who altered their views to please governments will alo be marked and in that stage we will see a fading view of intentional misrepresentation. Scientists have been protected by cushy jobs for the longest of times, by smearing the truth in different directions by marking these people governments will have to face the issues thrown at them, not set them to lay by. 

Even now as we see: “That means sea level rises are likely to reach 67cm by 2100, about 7cm more than the IPCC’s main prediction. Such a rate of rise will put 400 million people at risk of flooding every year, instead of the 360 million predicted by the IPCC, by the end of the century” we see an issue that could have been a reason for illumination years ago, but in the age of 1996-2006 the world was swallowed by the need of greed. Even now, we see blatant misrepresentation ‘Fossil fuel firms ‘could be sued’ for climate change‘, is that so? So we want to shove that bill to the Middle East? How about shoving it off to the US, they wanted a car driven population. So as I see ‘Filipino human rights committee finds world’s biggest oil companies have legal and moral responsibilities to act‘, which sounds partly fine when we see the international actions by the Royal Dutch Shell, yet in the end it is an economy that pushed for $29 plane seats, as such that the economy suddenly had cash to burn (almost literally), yet no one sets the value of such drives to the test. So as we are treated to “The head of a Philippines Commission on Human Rights panel, which has been investigating climate change for three years, revealed its conclusions on Monday that major fossil fuel firms may be held legally responsible for the impacts of their carbon emissions” (at https://www.independent.co.uk/environment/cop25-madrid-climate-change-greta-thunberg-fossil-fuel-lawsuit-a9239601.html) we see an absolute absence of the economies that pushed for those solutions, all to ignore a stage of economy no one wants to hear about in our times of debt and debt driven economies. Even now as we see the stories from half a dozen sources go on about how tree planting jobs could be yours, whilst NASA Engineer Mark Rober (at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U7nJBFjKqAY) showed a working solution that was modern and could be implemented months ago. he even gave visibility at https://teamtrees.org/, where we see that in 6 weeks he got to 17,756,768 of their required goal of 20,000,000 trees. A clear solution that is (obviously) being ignored by mainstream media. Even as the Independent (at https://www.independent.co.uk/environment/brexit-tree-planting-michael-gove-eu-conservatives-a9205371.html) gives us “‘It’s nonsense’: Michael Gove criticised after blaming EU for government missing tree-planting target” on November 16th 2019, way after the Mark Rober solution was presented, and whilst he presented it, it is clear that this working format was already in existence, so whilst Greenpiece and Michael Gove are butting heads, neither of them make mention of the solution that a NASA Engineer gave visibility to and tried (via viral ways) to entice people to help him get to the 20 million tree target. As I see it, the government, Greenpiece and several journo’s all missed the point that was out there to see for all. I wonder how many scientists have been overlooking certain solutions.

So whilst we get another clear view via “Successive Conservative governments have already ensured we will miss one tree-planting target in 2020, and we’re on track to miss the one in 2022. Now they’ve set themselves a new target for 2025 and people will be wondering whether this is raising the ambition or just moving the goalposts yet again“, we do not see the names of the people who have been pushing for these changes, I think that we are entitled to that, those people should not be allowed to hide behind the media, we are allowed to see the emphasis of all who agree of changed goalposts. And even as UK Labour will find some picture (like a baby in a hospital) to hide behind, lets face the truth that the sliding environmental values started in the 90’s, that measn that both sides of the isle is guilty of environmental rape. 

So whilst we see “Parties across the political spectrum have been boasting about the tree-planting efforts they would undertake if they won the general election” we should add the need to invalidate their right to govern for no less than 3 administrations should they FAIL to keep their word, especially when a happily flaky NASA engineer was able to show the opposite in a clear video, all with examples on how to tackle merely some of the issues we face on how to quickly plant trees (in an affordable way).

This all loosely relates an article in the Guardian (at https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2019/dec/07/oceans-losing-oxygen-at-unprecedented-rate-experts-warn) ‘Oceans losing oxygen at unprecedented rate, experts warn‘, the fact that we see “Dead zones – where oxygen is effectively absent – have quadrupled in extent in the last half-century, and there are also at least 700 areas where oxygen is at dangerously low levels, up from 45 when research was undertaken in the 1960s“, so where were all the alert signs a decade ago? Two decades ago? Were we all asleep? Was it hidden in the news papers on page 35 below the fold? The numbers give us that 650 oxygen deprivation areas were added in half a century, I reckon it would have been news two decades ago, so who aided people to hide these truths? As I see it those people are equally dangerous as mass murderers and any scientist on that stack of choices gets to be put on a list. So any scientist that is considering the ‘befehl ist befehl‘ excuse that some Germans used in November 1945, they better realise that the people had no qualms about hanging those people as well. In light of some information we can optionally agree with “the most profound impact on the marine environment has come from fishing. Ending overfishing is a quick, deliverable action which will restore fish populations“, if that is true, then why is there no global agreement on the actions of overfishing? Why do we see the laughingly inactions by Australian law groups in the Great Barrier reef? Why are poachers not arrested, their boats set up for action in another state (to prevent reacquisition) to limit poaching? There are dozens of other options and actions not being seen and the inactions against criminals acting against the environment is an almost global problem, as such the inactions of governments is becoming more and more debatable.

As such I wonder when the media will look at an actual list and give the people a clear view on who is misrepresenting the factual parts, I wonder what we see those scientists say. And lets not forget the number one action that governments use when the data does not meet the question, at that point some will merely rephrase the question, have you considered how often this solution has been an option for governments in environmental questions?

 

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Another Brick in the growing Wall

The wall of profit is going nicely in France, even as I would like to take another gander on how the western media is all about ignoring the Houthi attacks with drones on Saudi Arabia, it seems that we will get more on that soon enough. As I see it, we have a situation where at present 5 attacks have been ignored by the western media, like they are all about calling Saudi Arabia the big nasty, even though there is no factual evidence, merely biased opinion on several fronts. Today is not about that. Today is about France (the land of Wine, Cheese and Citroen). This place is pushing a few boundaries and even as we think that things are still open to discussion, it seems that the mighty bosses of banks (one particularly) have made their choice, I mentioned it a little over a week ago, yet all were easily persuaded to ignore it. Now that we are given: ‘French parliament passes “Huawei Law” to govern 5G security‘ (at http://telecoms.com/498728/french-parliament-passes-Huawei-law-to-govern-5g-security/), we see an optionally much larger change. This might be the first step in changing the landscape on a much larger scale and as far as I can tell it is just the beginning. There is an important notice to all this and it opposes the UK point of view to almost 180 degrees. In the UK, Alex Younger (big boss of MI-6), aka El Capitano de observadores furtivos is off the mind that important infrastructure should never be in foreign hands. This is a policy issue and I do not oppose this choice. It is the short minded and stupid American view of being shouting anti-Huawei accusations without proof that I object to. Now we see on the other side (France) where Mathieu Duchatel gives us “the French government is creating a regulatory environment that helps reduce its vulnerability to foreign intelligence collection“, which is another policy approach. I tend to like this more than the one Alex Younger gives, but both are valid points. Yet the one Duchatel gives us leaves the players with more options.

To see this, we need to go back to 1993, when Sybase and Microsoft dissolve the partnership they had and Microsoft receives a copy of the SQL Server code base, this was the best approach and after this we see that Microsoft sets their own designers to make evolve their SQL servers, a choice that ends up making them a direct competitor of the code Larry Ellison pushed for (the solution we know as Oracle), and whilst he went sailing across the oceans, MS SQL Server got the be lean and mean. Even as we see flaws, we see that Microsoft created a much larger market than we thought possible. It is that path Europe and America needed for 5G. So as the Yanks decided to screw themselves 6 ways from Sunday, Europe has a much better approach and now we see the path where France has opened up a dialogue to enable that solution down the track. It is a solution that would assist Huawei as well, as we see a solution that uses the Huawei 5G path as a benchmark, France et al could deploy a non-Chinese 5G solution that is set to the Chinese standards and that would suit China (read: Huawei) in a few ways. It all goes from bad to worse for America. What everyone seems to forget is that Azure in China is Shanghai Blue Cloud Technology Co., Ltd., a wholly (or is that holy) owned subsidiary of Beijing 21Vianet Broadband Data Center Co., Ltd. and it now implies that the accelerated evolution of 5G via Huawei has the stage where the best upgrades to implementation and facilitation to 5G will come from 21Vianet and not from Microsoft. Just as Sybase gave the keys to Microsoft in the 90’s, we now see the opposite where the business advantage will be with the Blue Cloud bosses, together with Huawei they now have a much larger advantage than anyone realises. Even as there is a shift in china through the players like BitTitan, I believe that Huawei is still preparing for a much larger innovation giving 21Vianet when that kicks off an overnight advantage that Microsoft cannot equal, not for a much longer time, leaving Microsoft losing momentum to a much larger.

If you want proof, then I have to admit that I cannot give it, the market seems to facilitate to a larger shift and it is not some hidden gem that no one else found. I believe that the Sybase example is what we face today, as Mathieu Duchatel is setting the new policy, we see policy that is accepted over most of the EU, so as Germany, Spain and Italy accept this push, most of the EU nations will follow, they are willing to drop America like a bad habit ion all this. The US overplayed its hand and now they will face the consequences of choice. In this the UK must soon make up its own mind. The path Alex Younger opted for was not wrong, but it is a larger choice that could impede economic growth to a much longer degree for a much longer time, two elements the UK does not really have at present.

The SCMP article (at https://www.scmp.com/news/china/diplomacy/article/3020354/while-weighing-5g-security-risks-france-predicts-it-can-manage) we see another solution for France and somehow I believe Credit Agricole had been preparing for this step a little longer than most others. France needs to be on top of this as 2024 Paris is coming near soon enough, implying that a multi-billion euro scheme for 5G will be announced before years end to get anywhere near ready and it seems that the Credit Agricole dividend is about to push upwards to a much larger degree. And when we get to the end of the article where we see: “5G infrastructure poses more complex problems. The distinction between core and edge is no longer as relevant, as many software operations will operate in the cloud“, we get to be introduced to the benefit and advantage that Beijing 21Vianet Broadband Data Center Co. now gets to have; Microsoft forgot that most cannot get to China (for simple linguistic considerations) that limitation does not exist in the other direction. And now as the cogs connect we see how the market takes a shift. Remember when I made the joke (and connection) to the cloud; it is merely someone else’s computer. Everyone so needy to muddy the water claiming it is so much more complex. OK, to the smallest degree it is.

To see my point of view consider the NASA Mainframe that was there for the moon landing (and perhaps a little more), now consider my old Mobile, this 2011 mobile needs 5% of available processing power to do what that entire NASA room did. The mobile that followed 4 years later was 400% more powerful with 1600% more storage and the one that followed was close to 300% more powerful than the previous one with an additional 1600% more storage, the market shifted THAT fast.

So when we see a data center now, and consider that a dozen racks with terabyte storage can be replaced by ONE drive, yes there is an Exabyte drive now, one drive with well over 1,000,000 terabytes. We are nowhere near replacing the entire data center, yet in 10 years, that center could be replaced by one large tower in that time, it might look a little different (I always loved the Cray systems, it comes with a place to sit and heating, but that so called ‘cloud’ will be in one clear specific location (just as it is now) and that is the issue;

it is the location of someone else’s computer that is the issue, soon it will no longer be in America, China is now in a position to offer the same, optionally cheaper and when the America BS starts with ‘It needs some vague quality seal of approval‘ (a SAS marketing trick we saw 20 years ago).

It will be at that point that the entire mess becomes ugly real fast and we are already pushing in that direction. The problem is not China, or America. It will be the policy considerations on where data is allowed to be; a lot of cloud issues on data locations are still open to discussion. The problem is not the hardware, it will be the place with the most logical policy in place, that will be the main player for the next stage and it seems that France has been keeping busy on becoming that European location. I reckon that China does not care, as long as they get the business and that is when we see the American failure on getting the business. They planned on greed when pragmatism was the only solution to push the market forward. Now as most nations start waking up on the loss of pragmatism, we see the consideration, to be a player or a tool and some are realising that they banked on the wrong horse and the American horse is about to become a ‘horse no show!

Whether it was merely some bank, some policy, or a larger linked consideration, this time the French have played a good long term game and they have every chance to reap the benefits of that game. We have yet to see how it all plays out and Paris 2024 will be the big test, but as the issue stands, the French are pushing forward, it is there that I found some references to Credit Agricole, DGSE, and a very large billion dollar option. Even as 21Vianet and its subsidiaries are not mentions, neither is Azure in any way, it all falls to the one mention of ‘Microsoft Corporation‘. This might all be true, but I still seek confirmation, on a stage this large 21Vianet could not have been unmentioned, the same for the entire Azure part. the line “the proliferation of real-time data from sources such as mobile devices, web, social media, sensors, log files, and transactional applications, Big Data has found a host of vertical market applications, ranging from fraud detection to scientific R&D“, makes its absence of certain players either short sighted or the elements of that article were unreliable. I believe it to be a little of both.

I wonder how the game unfolds; I reckon we will know a lot more by the end of the year.

 

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