A new interview with Thiel is up on reason.com, which took place during the Singularity Summit last September. I’ve mentioned before that, as a fellow chess player, stock trader, libertarian and Singularitarian, I am a fan of Thiel.
This quote made me laugh, because I agree:

Reason: Bill Joy, the former chief scientist at Sun Microsystems, declared in his famous article “Why the Future Doesn’t Need Us” that we have to relinquish artificial intelligence, biotech, and nanotechnology because they’re just too dangerous for human beings to handle. Is there some truth to that?

Thiel: I think it’s not even wrong. It’s one of those things that’s so far off the mark that it is not even wrong.

Thiel has recently invested in Milton Friedman’s grandson’s Seasteading Institute.

Tyro and I have a nice discussion going on over on his blog which started with the Resurrection and has now progressed into a discussion of the Sermon on the Mount.
It reminded me of how much I love the writings of Tolstoy and Marcus Arelius. I know I’ve mentioned my admiration of Tolstoy before, but Marcus Arelius is awesome too. What amazed me when I read Meditations was how true the things he said were and how much just as relevant they are today. I was stunned and awed. It really proved to me that there is a fundamental Truth in humanity. How else - when so much, almost everything, has changed in the world and with society since then - could so much remain true? Not only did they remain true, but they spoke to me deeply. They touched me at the core of my ethics, they seemed to tap into my soul.

The Blue Brain Project’s response to the above questions is:

We really do not know. If consciousness arises because of some critical mass of interactions, then it may be possible. But we really do not understand what consciousness actually is, so it is difficult to say.

Here is a video simulation of the neocortical column of the brain that I mentioned in my last post about Blue Brain:

An inside look through the column:

Here, a single neuron is highlighted:

And here is a close up of a single Blue Brain neuron:

I think the chances are better than 20%

But what is the difference between “simulation” and “reality”? Does a simulation not happen in reality? Aren’t they the same thing, really?
And if I am inside a computer - so what? It is still real. It is happening. Whether inside a computer or not, it is still happening in reality.
Reality is just another name for the present.

“Full effort is full victory…”

-Gandhi

I’ve posted before about how I think most traders will benefit from nootropics or “cosmetic neurology” (substances which are claimed to boost human cognitive abilities) in the very near future. This latimes article goes into some depth about it:

“There isn’t any question about it — they made me a much better player,” said Paul Phillips, 35, who credited the attention deficit drug Adderall and the narcolepsy pill Provigil with helping him earn more than $2.3 million as a poker player.

“Poker is the sort of game that a lot of people can play well sporadically, but tournaments are mostly won by people who can play close to their best at all times,” he said. “It requires significant mental effort to play in top form for 12 hours a day, five days in a row.”

Day traders: your competition is probably already eating this stuff now.

“You still have adrenaline flowing in your body, but you don’t feel that adrenaline rush so you’re not distracted by your own nervousness,” said Dr. Bernd F. Remler, a neurologist at the Medical College of Wisconsin in Milwaukee.

I found this article in the nytimes (from Jan. 2000) about Parrando’s paradox very interesting. Two losing games can be combined to create a winning strategy.

Economists are studying Parrando’s paradox to help find the best strategies for managing investments. Dr. Sergei Maslov, a physicist at Brookhaven National Laboratory in Upton, N.Y., recently showed that if an investor simultaneously shared capital between two losing stock portfolios, capital would increase rather than decrease. ”It’s mind-boggling,” Dr. Maslov said. ”You can turn two minuses into a plus.” But so far, he said, it is too early to apply his model to the real stock market because of its complexity.

I’m dying to know more about this. Anyone heard of it being used in the market?
I’m also headed to Las Vegas this coming weekend - maybe if I alternate between craps and blackjack I can make millions.
I was disappointed to read this:

Unfortunately, Parrando’s paradox will not work for the kinds of games played in casinos, Dr. Abbott said. Games A and B must be set up to copy a ratchet, which means they must have some direct interaction.

Wikipedia also says that this theory won’t work in the stock market for the same reason.
There must be a way. Maybe I can figure something out on the 5 hour flight to Vegas.

I was reading this article when I came across an expression I had never heard before (emphasis mine):

Reversal of fortune. Elvis has left the building. Refunding. Toss your cookies. Call Ralph on the big white phone. Puke.

I thought it was pretty funny and strange. What a strange saying. “Call Ralph on the big white phone?” I like it.
I guess it has to do with the fact that when you vomit it sometimes sounds like you are saying “Ralph.” But I don’t think it does, really. And I guess the “big white phone” is really the toilet? I never really thought of the toilet as a phone.
At some point someone must have thought that vomiting into a toilet seemed somewhat similar to if you were calling a guy named Ralph on a giant white porcelain telephone sitting on the floor.
In one of the Harry Potter movies, one guy is comforting the other (who is vomiting) and says, “better out than in.” I like that one, too.

Rail travel at high speed is not possible because the passengers, unable to breathe, would die of asphyxia.

— Dr. Dionysus Lardner, University College, London (1830)
from responsible nanotechnology